THE   SIX   SYSTEMS 


OF 


INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY 


OF 


INDIAN   PHILOSOPHY 


BY 


THE  RIGHT  HON.  F.  MAX  MULLER,  K.M. 

FOREIGN    MEMBER  OF   THE   FRENCH   INSTITUTE 


NEW   YORK 

LONGMANS,     GREEN,     AND     CO. 

LONDON   AND   BOMBAY 

1899 


PREFACE. 


IT  is  not  without  serious  misgivings  that  I  venture 
at  this  late  hour  of  life  to  place  before  my  fellow- 
workers  and  all  who  are  interested  in  the  growth 
of  philosophical  thought  throughout  the  world,  some 
of  the  notes  on  the  Six  Systems  of  Indian  Philo- 
sophy which  have  accumulated  in  my  note-books 
for  many  years.  It  was  as  early  as  1852  that  I 
published  my  first  contributions  to  the  study  of 
Indian  philosophy  in  the  Zeitsckrift  der  Deutschen 
Morgenlandischen  Gesellschaft.  My  other  occupa- 
tions, however,  and,  more  particularly,  my  prepara- 
tions for  a  complete  edition  of  the  Rig- Veda,  and 
its  voluminous  commentary,  did  not  allow  me  at 
that  time  to  continue  these  contributions,  though 
my  interest  in  Indian  philosophy,  as  a  most  im- 
portant part  of  the  literature  of  India  and  of 
Universal  Philosophy,  has  always  remained  the 
same.  This  interest  was  kindled  afresh  when 
I  had  to  finish  for  the  Sacred  Books  of  the  East 
(vols.  I  and  XV)  my  translation  of  the  Upanishads. 
the  remote  sources  of  Indian  philosophy,  and 
especially  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy,  a  system  in 
which  human  speculation  seems  to  me  to  have 
reached  its  very  acme.  Some  of  the  other  systems 
of  Indian  philosophy  also  have  from  time  to  time 


VI  PREFACE. 

roused  the  curiosity  of  scholars  and  philosophers  in 
Europe  and  America,  and  in  India  itself  a  revival 
of  philosophic  and  theosophic  studies,  though  not 
always  well  directed,  has  taken  place,  which,  if  it 
leads  to  a  more  active  co-operation  between  Euro- 
pean and  Indian  thinkers,  may  be  productive  in  the 
rnture  of  most  important  results.  Under  these  cir- 
cumstances a  general  desire  has  arisen,  and  has 
repeatedly  been  expressed,  for  the  publication  of 
a  more  general  and  comprehensive  account  of  the 
six  systems  in  which  the  philosophical  thought  of 
India  has  found  its  full  realisation. 

More  recentlv  the  excellent  publications  of  Pro- 
fessors Deussen  and  Garbe  in  Germany,  and  of  Dr. 
G.  Thibaut  in  India,  have  given  a  new  impulse  to 
these  important  studies,  important  not  only  in  the 
eyes  of  Sanskrit  scholars  by  profession,  but  of  all 
who  wish  to  become  acquainted  with  all  the  solutions 
which  the  most  highly  gifted  races  of  mankind  have 
proposed  for  the  eternal  riddles  of  the  world.  These 
studies,  to  quote  the  words  of  a  high  authority, 
have  indeed  ceased  to  be  the  hobby  of  a  few  indi- 
viduals, and  have  become  a  subject  of  interest  to 
the  whole  nation  '.  Professor  Deussen's  work  on 
the  Vedanta-philosophy  (1883)  an(l  nis  translation 
of  the  Vedanta-Sutras  (1887),  Professor  Garbe's 
translation  of  the  Samkhya-Sutras  (1889)  followed 
by  his  work  on  the  Su^khya-philosophy  (1894), 
and,  last  not  least,,  Dr.  G.  Thibaut's  careful  and 
most  useful  translation  of  the  Vedanta-Sutras  in 
vols.  XXXIV  and  XXXVIII  of  the  Sacred  Books 
of  the  East  (1890  and  1896),  mark  a  new  era  in  the 


Words  of  the  Viceroy  of  India,  see  Times,  Nov.  8,  1898. 


PREFACE.  vii 

study  of  the  two  most  important  philosophical 
systems  of  ancient  India,  and  have  deservedly 
placed  the  names  of  their  authors  in  the  front  rank 
of  Sanskrit  scholars  in  Europe. 

My  object  in  publishing  the  results  of  my  own 
studies  in  Indian  philosophy  was  not  so  much  to  re- 
state the  mere  tenets  of  each  system,  so  deliberately 
and  so  clearly  put  forward  by  the  reputed  authors 
of  the  principal  philosophies  of  India,  as  to  give 
a  more  comprehensive  account  of  the  philosophical 
activity  of  the  Indian  nation  from  the  earliest  times, 
and  to  show  how  intimately  not  only  their  religion, 
but  their  philosophy  also,  was  connected  with  the 
national  character  of  the  inhabitants  of  India, 
a  point  of  view  which  has  of  late  been  so  ably 
maintained  by  Professor  Knight  of  St.  Andrews 

University  *. 

*/ 

It  was  only  in.  a  country  like  India,  with  all 
its  physical  advantages  and  disadvantages,  that 
such  a  rich  development  of  philosophical  thought 
as  'we  can  watch  in  the  six  systems  of  philosophy, 
could  have  taken  place.  In  ancient  India  there 
could  hardly  have  been  a  very  severe  struggle  for  life. 
The  necessaries  of  life  were  abundantly  provided  by 
nature,  and  people  with  few  tastes  could  live  there 
like  the  birds  in  a  forest,  and  soar  like  birds 
towards  the  fresh  air  of  heaven  and  the  eternal 
sources  of  light  and  truth.  What  was  there  to  do 
for  those  who,  in  order  to  escape  from  the  heat  of  the 
tropical  sun,  had  taken  their  abode  in  the  shade  of 
groves  or  in  the  caves  of  mountainous  valleys  except 
to  meditate  on  the  world  in  which  they  found  them- 


See  'Mind,'  vol.  v.  no.  17. 


Vlll  PREFACE. 

selves  placed,  they  did  not  know  how  or  why  ? 
There  was  hardly  any  political  life  in  ancient  India, 
such  as  we  know  it  from  the  Vedas,  and  in  con- 
sequence neither  political  strife  nor  municipal  ambi- 
tion. Neither  art  nor  science  existed  as  yet,  to 
call  forth  the  energies  of  this  highly  gifted  race. 
While  we,  overwhelmed  with  newspapers,  with 
parliamentary  reports,  with  daily  discoveries  and 
discussions,  with  new  novels  and  time-killing  social 
functions,  have  hardly  any  leisure  left  to  dwell  on 
metaphysical  and  religious  problems,  these  problems 
formed  almost  the  only  subject  on  which  the  old 
inhabitants  of  India  could  spend  their  intellectual 
energies.  Life  in  a  forest  was  no  impossibility  in 
the  Avarm  climate  of  India,  and  in  the  absence  of 
the  most  ordinary  means  of  communication,  what 
was  there  to  do  for  the  members  of  the  small 
settlements  dotted  over  the  country,  but  to  give 
expression  to  that  wonder  at  the  world  which  is 
the  beginning  of  all  philosophy  ?  Literary  ambition 
could  hardly  exist  during  a  period  when  even  tli^ 
art  of  writing  was  not  yet  known,  and  when  there 
was  no  literature  except  what  could  be  spread  and 
handed  down  by  memory,  developed  to  an  extra- 
ordinary and  almost  incredible  extent  under  a  care- 
fully elaborated  discipline.  But  at  a  time  when 
people  could  not  yet  think  of  public  applause  or 
private  gain,  they  thought  till  the  more  of  truth  ; 
and  hence  the  perfectly  independent  and  honest 
character  of  most  of  their  philosophy. 

It  has  long  been  my  wish  to  bring  the  results 
of  this  national  Indian  philosophy  nearer  to  us. 
and,  if  possible,  to  rouse  our  sympathies  for  their 
honest  efforts  to  throw  some  rays  of  li<rht  on 


PREFACE.  IX 

the  dark  problems  of  existence,  whether  of  the  ob- 
jective world  at  large,  or  of  the  subjective  spirits, 
whose  knowledge  of  the  world  constitutes,  after  all, 
the  only  proof  of  the  existence  of  an  objective  world. 
The  mere  tenets  of  each  of  the  six  systems  of  Indian 
philosophy  are  by  this  time  well  known,  or  easily 
accessible,  more  accessible,  I  should  say,  than  even 
those  of  the  leading  philosophers  of  Greece  or  of 
modern  Europe.  Every  one  of  the  opinions  at 
which  the  originators  of  the  six  principal  schools  of 
Indian  philosophy  arrived,  has  been  handed  down 
to  us  in  the  form  of  short  aphorisms  or  Sutras,  so 
as  to  leave  but  little  room  for  uncertainty  as  to 
the  exact  position  which  each  of  these  philosophers 
occupied  on  the  great  battlefield  of  thought.  We 
know  what  an  enormous  amount  of  labour  had 
to  be  spent  and  is  still  being  spent  in  order  to 
ascertain  the  exact  views  of  Plato  and  Aristotle, 
nay,  even  of  Kant  and  Hegel,  on  some  of  the  most 
important  questions  of  their  systems  of  philosophy. 
There  are  even  living  philosophers  whose  words 
often  leave  us  in  doubt  as  to  what  they  mean, 
whether  they  are  materialists  or  idealists,  monists 
or  dualists,  theists  or  atheists.  Hindu  philosophers 
seldom  leave  us  in  doubt  on  such  important  points, 
and  they  certainly  never  shrink  from  the  conse- 
quences of  their  theories.  They  never  equivo- 
cate or  try  to  hide  their  opinions  where  they  are 
likely  to  be  unpopular.  Kapila,  for  instance,  the 
author  or  hero  eponymus  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy, 
confesses  openly  that  his  system  is  atheistic,  an- 
i.svara,  without  an  active  Lord  or  God,  but  in  spite  of 
that,  his  system  was  treated  as  legitimate  by  his  con- 
temporaries, because  it  was  reasoned  out  consistently, 


X  PREFACE. 

and  admitted,  nay,  required  some  transcendent  and 
invisible  power,  the  so-called  Purushas.  Without 
them  there  would  be  no  evolution  of  Praknti, 
original  matter,  no  objective  world,  nor  any  reality 
in  the  lookers-on  themselves,  the  Purushas  or  spirits. 
Mere  names  have  acquired  with  us  such  a  power 
that  the  authors  of  systems  in  which  there  is 
clearly  no  room  for  an  active  God,  nevertheless 
shrink  from  calling  themselves  atheists,  nay,  try 
even  by  any  means  to  foist  an  active  God  into 
their  philosophies,  in  order  to  escape  the  damaging 
charge  of  atheism.  This  leads  to  philosophical  am- 
biguity, if  not  dishonesty,  and  has  often  delayed 
the  recognition  of  a  Godhead,  free  from  all  the 
trammels  of  human  activity  and  personality,  but 
yet  endowed  with  wisdom,  power,  and  will.  From 
a  philosophical  point  of  view,  no  theory  of  evolution? 
whether  ancient  or  modern  (in  Sanskrit  Parmama), 
can  provide  any  room  for  a  creator  or  governor  of 
the  world,  and  hence  the  Sa?/zkhya-philosophy  de- 
clares itself  fearlessly  as  an-i.svara,  Lord-less,  leaving 
it  to  another  philosophy,  the  Yoga,  to  find  in  the 
old  Sa?/ikhya  system  some  place  for  an  Isvara  or 
a  personal  God.  What  is  most  curious  is  that 
a  philosopher,  such  as  *Sa/»kara,  the  most  decided 
monist,  and  the  upholder  of  Brahman,  as  a  neuter, 
as  the  cause  of  all  things,  is  reported  to  have  been 
a  worshipper  of  idols  and  to  have  seen  in  them, 
despite  of  all  their  hideousness,  symbols  of  the 
Deity,  useful,  as  he  thought,  for  the  ignorant,  even 
though  they  have  no  eyes  as  yet  to  see  what  is 
hidden  behind  the  idols,  and  what  was  the  true 
meaning  of  them. 

What   I   admire   in    Indian    philosophers    is    that 


PREFACE.  XI 

they  never  try  to  deceive  us  as  to  their  principles 
and  the  consequences  of  their  theories.  If  they  are 
idealists,  even  to  the  verge  of  nihilism,  they  say  so, 
and  if  they  hold  that  the  objective  world  requires 
a  real,  though  not  necessarily  a  visible  or  tangible 
substratum,  they  are  never  afraid  to  speak  out.  They 
are  bona  Jide  idealists  or  materialists,  monists  or 
dualists,  theists  or  atheists,  because  their  reverence 
for  truth  is  stronger  than  their  reverence  for  anything 
else.  The  Vedantist,  for  instance,  is  a  fearless  idealist, 
and,  as  a  monist,  denies  the  reality  of  anything  but 
the  One  Brahman,  the  Universal  Spirit,  which  is 
to  account  for  the  whole  of  the  phenomenal  world. 
The  followers  of  the  Samkhya,  on  the  contrary, 
though  likewise  idealists  and  believers  in  an  unseen 
Purusha  (subject),  and  an  unseen  Prakriti  (objective 
substance),  leave  us  in  no  doubt  that  they  are  and 
mean  to  be  atheists,  so  far  as  the  existence  of  an 
active  God,  a  maker  and  ruler  of  the  world,  is 
concerned.  They  do  not  allow  themselves  to  be 
driven  one  inch  beyond  their  self-chosen  position. 
They  first  examine  the  instruments  of  knowledge 
which  man  possesses.  These  are  sensuous  percep- 
tion, inference,  and  verbal  authority,  and  as  none  of 
these  can  supply  us  with  the  knowledge  of  a  Supreme 
Being,  as  a  personal  creator  and  ruler  of  the  world, 
Kapila  never  refers  to  Him  in  his  Sutras.  As  a 
careful  reason er,  however,  he  does  not  go  so  far  as 
to  say  that  he  can  prove  the  non-existence  of  such 
a  Being,  but  he  is  satisfied  with  stating,  like 
Kant,  that  he  cannot  establish  His  existence  by  the 
ordinary  channels  of  evidential  knowledge.  In 
neither  of  these  statements  can  I  discover,  as  others 
have  done,  any  trace  of  intellectual  cowardice,  but 


Xll  PREFACE. 

simply  a  desire  to  abide  within  the  strict  limits  of 
knowledge,  such  as  is  granted  to  human  beings. 
He  does  not  argue  against  the  possibility  even  of 
the  gods  of  the  vulgar,  such  as  >Siva,  Visrmu,  and 
all  the  rest,  he  simply  treats  them  as  6ranyesvaras 
or  Karyesvaras,  produced  and  temporal  gods  (Sutras 
III,  57,  comm.),  and  he  does  not  allow,  even  to  the 
Supreme  Isvara,  the  Lord,  the  creator  and  ruler 
of  the  world,  as  postulated  by  other  systems  of 
philosophy  or  religion,  more  than  a  phenomenal 
existence,  though  we  should  always  remember  that 
with  him  there  is  nothing  phenomenal,  nothing  con- 
fined in  space  and  time,  that  does  not  in  the  end 
rest  on  something  real  and  eternal. 

We  must  distinguish  however.  Kapila,  though  he 
boldly  confessed  himself  an  atheist,  was  by  no  means 
a  nihilist  or  Nastika.  He  recognised  in  every  man 
a  soul  which  he  called  Purusha,  literally  man,  or 
spirit,  or  subject,  because  without  such  a  power, 
without  such  endless  Purushas,  he  held  that  Prakriti, 
or  primordial  matter  with  its  infinite  potentialities, 
would  for  ever  have  remained  dead,  motionless, 
and  thoughtless.  Only  through  the  presence  of  this 
Purusha  and  through  his  temporary  interest  in 
Prakriti  could  her  movements,  her  evolution,  her 
changes  and  variety  be  accounted  for,  just  as  the 
movements  of  iron  have  to  be  accounted  for  by  the 
presence  of  a  magnet.  All  this  movement,  however, 
is  temporary  only,  and  the  highest  object  of  Kapila's 
philosophy  is  to  make  Purusha  turn  his  eyes  away 
from  Prakr/ti,  so  as  to  stop  her  acting  and  to  regain 
for  himself  his  oneness,  his  aloneness,  his  indepen- 
dence, and  his  perfect  bliss. 

Whatever  we   may  think   of  such   views  of  the 


PREFACE.  Xlii 

world  as  are  put  forward  by  the  Sa?7ikhya,  the 
Vedanta,  and  other  systems  of  Indian  philo- 
sophy, there  is  one  thing  which  we  cannot  help 
admiring,  and  that  is  the  straightforwardness  and 
perfect  freedom  with  which  they  are  elaborated. 
However  imperfect  the  style  in  which  their  theories 
have  been  clothed  may  appear  from  a  literary  point 
of  view,  it  seems  to  me  the  very  perfection  for  the 
treatment  of  philosophy.  It  never  leaves  us  in  any 
doubt  as  to  the  exact  opinions  held  by  each  philo- 
sopher. We  may  miss  the  development  and  the 
dialectic  eloquence  with  which  Plato  and  Hegel 
propound  their  thoughts,  but  we  can  always  appre- 
ciate the  perfect  freedom,  freshness,  and  downright- 
ness  with  which  each  searcher  after  truth  follows 
his  track  without  ever  looking  right  or  left. 

It  is  in  the  nature  of  philosophy  that  every 
philosopher  must  be  a  heretic,  in  the  etymological 
sense  of  the  word,  that  is,  a  free  chooser,  even  if, 
like  the  Vedantists,  he,  for  some  reason  or  other, 
bows  before  his  self-chosen  Veda  as  the  seat  of 
a  revealed  authority. 

It  has  sometimes  been  said  that  Hindu  philosophy 
asserts,  but  does  not  prove,  that  it  is  positive 
throughout,  but  not  argumentative.  This  may  be 
true  to  a  certain  extent  and  particularly  with  regard 
to  the  Vedanta-philosophy,  but  we  must  remember 
that  almost  the  first  question  which  every  one  of 
the  Hindu  systems  of  philosophy  tries  to  settle 
is,  How  do  we  know  ?  In  thus  giving  the  Noetics 
the  first  place,  the  thinkers  of  the  East  seem  to  me 
again  superior  to  most  of  the  philosophers  of  the 
West.  Generally  speaking,  they  admitted  three 
legitimate  channels  by  which  knowledge  can  reach 


XIV  PREFACE. 

us,  perception,  inference,  and  authority,  but  authority 
freely  chosen  or  freely  rejected.  In  some  systems 
that  authority  is  revelation,  >Sruti,  $abda,  or  the 
Veda,  in  others  it  is  the  word  of  any  recognised 
authority,  Apta-va&ana.  Thus  it  happens  that  the 
S&mkhya  philosophers,  who  profess  themselves  en- 
tirely dependent  on  reasoning  (Manana),  may  never- 
theless accept  some  of  the  utterances  of  the  Veda 
as  they  wrould  accept  the  opinions  of  eminent  men  or 
<Sishfas,  though  always  with  the  proviso  that  even 
the  Veda  could  never  make  a  false  opinion  true. 
The  same  relative  authority  is  granted  to  Smrtti 
or  tradition,  but  there  with  the  proviso  that  it  must 
not  be  in  contradiction  with  ^Sruti  or  revelation. 

Such  an  examination  of  the  authorities  of  human 
knowledge  (Pramanas)  ought,  of  course,  to  form  the 
introduction  to  every  system  of  philosophy,  and  to 
have  clearly  seen  this  is,  as  it  seems  to  me,  a  very 
high  distinction  of  Indian  philosophy.  How  much 
useless  controversy  would  have  been  avoided,  par- 
ticularly among  Jewish,  Mohammedan,  and  Christian 
philosophers,  if  a  proper  place  had  been  assigned  in 
limine  to  the  question  of  what  constitutes  our  legiti- 
mate or  our  only  possible  channels  of  knowledge, 
whether  perception,  inference,  revelation,  or  any- 
thing else  ! 

Supported  by  these  inquiries  into  the  evidences  of 
truth,  Hindu  philosophers  have  built  up  their  various 
systems  of  philosophy,  or  their  various  conceptions 
of  the  world,  telling  us  clearly  what  they  take  for 
granted,  and  then  advancing  step  by  step  from  the 
foundations  to  the  highest  pinnacles  of  their  systems. 
The  Vedantist,  after  giving  us  his  reasons  why  reve- 
lation or  the  Veda  stands  higher  with  him  than 


PREFACE.  XV 

sensuous  perception  and  inference,  at  least  for  the 
discovery  of  the  highest  truth  (Paramartha),  actually 
puts  $ruti  in  the  place  of  sensuous  perception,  and 
allows  to  perception  and  inference  no  more  than  an 
authority  restricted  to  the  phenomenal  (Vyavaharika) 
world.  The  conception  of  the  world  as  deduced 
from  the  Veda,  and  chiefly  from  the  Upanishads, 
is  indeed  astounding.  It  could  hardly  have  been 
arrived  at  by  a  sudden  intuition  or  inspiration,  but 
presupposes  a  long  preparation  of  metaphysical 
thought,  undisturbed  by  any  foreign  influences.  All 
that  exists  is  taken  as  One,  because  if  the  existence 
of  anything  besides  the  absolute  One  or  the  Supreme 
Being  were  admitted,  whatever  the  Second  by  the 
side  of  the  One  might  be,  it  would  constitute  a  limit 
to  what  was  postulated  as  limitless,  and  would  have 
made  the  concept  of  the  One  self-contradictory.  But 
then  came  the  question  for  Indian  philosophers  to 
solve,  how  it  was  possible,  if  there  was  but  the  One, 
that  there  should  be  multiplicity  in  the  world,  and 
that  there  should  be  constant  change  in  our  experi- 
ence. They  knew  that  the  one  absolute  and  unde- 
termined essence,  what  they  called  Brahman,  could 
have  received  no  impulse  to  change,  either  from 
itself,  for  it  was  perfect,  nor  from  others,  for  it  was 
Second-less. 

Then  what  is  the  philosopher  to  say  to  this  mani- 
fold and  ever-changing  world  ?  There  is  one  thing 
only  that  he  can  say,  namely,  that  it  is  not  and 
cannot  be  real,  but  must  be  accepted  as  the  result 
of  nescience  or  Avidya,  not  only  of  individual 
ignorance,  but  of  ignorance  as  inseparable  from 
human  nature.  That  ignorance,  though  unreal  in 
the  highest  sense,  exists,  but  it  can  be  destroyed 


XVI  PREFACE. 

by  Vidya,  knowledge,  i.  e.  the  knowledge  conveyed 
by  the  Vedanta,  and  as  nothing  that  can  at  any 
time  be  annihilated  has  a  right  to  be  considered 
as  real,  it  follows  that  this  cosmic  ignorance  also 
must  be  looked  upon  as  not  real,  but  temporary 
only.  It  cannot  be  said  to  exist,  nor  can  it  be  said 
not  to  exist,  just  as  our  own  ordinary  ignorance, 
though  we  suffer  from  it  for  a  time,  can  never  claim 
absolute  reality  and  perpetuity.  It  is  impossible  to 
define  Avidya,  as  little  as  it  is  possible  to  define 
Brahman,  with  this  difference,  however,  that  the 
former  can  be  annihilated,  the  latter  never.  The 
phenomenal  world  which,  according  to  the  Vedanta, 
is  called  forth,  like  the  mirage  in  a  desert,  has  its 
reality  in  Brahman  alone.  Only  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  what  we  perceive  can  never  be  the 
absolute  Brahman,  but  a  perverted  picture  only,  just 
as  the  moon  which  we  see  manifold  and  tremulous  in 
its  ever  changing  reflections  on  the  waving  surface 
of  the  ocean,  is  not  the  real  moon,  though  deriving 
its  phenomenal  character  from  the  real  moon  which 
remains  unaffected  in  its  unapproachable  remote- 
ness. Whatever  we  may  think  of  such  a  view  of 
the  cosmos,  a  cosmos  which,  it  should  be  remem- 
bered, includes  ourselves  quite  as  much  as  what  we 
call  the  objective  world,  it  is  clear  that  our  name  of 
nihilism  would  be  by  no  means  applicable  to  it. 

The  One  Real  Being  is  there,  the  Brahman,  only 
it  is  not  visible,  nor  perceptible  in  its  true  character 
by  any  of  the  senses  ;  but  without  it,  nothing  that 
exists  in  our  knowledge  could  exist,  neither  our 
Self  nor  what  in  our  knowledge  is  not  our  Self. 

This  is  one  view  of  the  world,  the  Vedanta  view; 
another  is  that  of  the  Sa?«khya,  which  looks  upon 


PREFACE.  XV11 

our  perceptions  as  perceptions  of  a  substantial  some- 
thing, of  Prakrtti,  the  potentiality  of  all  things, 
and  treats  the  individual  perceiver  as  eternally 
individual,  admitting  nothing  besides  these  two 
powers,  which  by  their  union  or  identification  cause 
what  we  call  the  world,  and  by  their  discrimination 
or  separation  produce  final  bliss  or  absoluteness. 

These  two,  with  some  other  less  important  views 
of  the  world,  as  put  forward  by  the  other  systems 
of  Indian  philosophy,  constitute  the  real  object  of 
what  was  originally  meant  by  philosophy,  that  is 
an  explanation  of  the  world.  This  determining  idea 
has  secured  even  to  the  guesses  of  Thales  and 
Heraclitus  their  permanent  place  among  the  historical 
representatives  of  the  development  of  philosophical 
thought  by  the  side  of  Plato  and  Aristotle,  of  Des 
Cartes  and  Spinoza.  It  is  in  that  Walhalla  of  real 
philosophers  that  I  claim  a  place  of  honour  for  the 
representatives  of  the  Vedanta  and  Samkhya.  Of 
course,  it  is  possible  so  to  define  the  meaning  of 
philosophy  as  to  exclude  men  such  as  even  Plato  and 
Spinoza  altogether,  and  to  include  on  the  contrary 
every  botanist,  entomologist,  or  bacteriologist.  The 
name  itself  is  of  no  consequence,  but  its  definition 
is.  And  if  hitherto  no  one  would  have  called  him- 
self a  philosopher  who  had  not  read  and  studied  the 
works  of  Plato  and  Aristotle,  of  Des  Cartes  and 
Spinoza,  of  Locke,  Hume,  and  Kant  in  the  original, 
I  hope  that  the  time  will  come  when  no  one  will 
claim  that  name  who  is  not  acquainted  at  least  with 
the  two  prominent  systems  of  ancient  Indian  philo- 
sophy, the  Vedanta  and  the  Samkhya.  A  President, 
however  powerful,  does  not  call  himself  His  Majesty, 
why  should  an  observer,  a  collector  and  analyser, 

b 


XVlil  PREFACE. 

however   full   of    information,    claim    the   name   of 
philosopher  ? 

As  a  rule,  I  believe  that  no  one  knows  so  well  the 
defects  of  his  book  as  the  author  himself,  and  I  can 
truly  say  in  my  own  case  that  few  people  can  be  so 
conscious  of  the  defects  of  this  History  of  Indian 
Philosophy  as  I  myself.  It  cannot  be  called  a 
history,  because  the  chronological  framework  is,  as 
yet,  almost  entirely  absent.  It  professes  to  be  no 
more  than  a  description  of  some  of  the  salient  points 
of  each  of  the  six  recognised  systems  of  Indian  philo- 
sophy. It  does  not  claim  to  be  complete  ;  on  the 
contrary,  if  I  can  claim  any  thanks,  it  is  for  having 
endeavoured  to  omit  whatever  seemed,  to  me  less 
important  and  not  calculated  to  appeal  to  European 
sympathies.  If  we  want  our  friends  to  love  our 
friends,  we  do  not  give  a  full  account  of  every  one 
of  their  good  qualities,  but  we  dwell  on  one  or  two 
of  the  strong  points  of  their  character.  This  is  what 
I  have  tried  to  do  for  my  old  friends,  Badarayana, 
Kapila,  and  all  the  rest.  Even  thus  it  could  not  well 
be  avoided  that  in  giving  an  account  of  each  of  the 
six  systems,  there  should  be  much  repetition,  for  they 
all  share  so  much  in  common,  with  but  slight  modifi- 
cations ;  and  the  longer  I  have  studied  the  various 
systems,  the  more  have  I  become  impressed  with  the 
truth  of  the  view  taken  by  Vigwana-Bhikshu  and 
others  that  there  is  behind  the  variety  of  the  six- 
systems  a  common  fund  of  what  may  be  called 
national  or  popular  philosophy,  a  large  Manasa  lake  of 
philosophical  thought  and  language,  far  away  in  the 
distant  North,  and  in  the  distant  Past,  from  which 
each  thinker  was  allowed  to  draw  for  his  own  pur- 
poses. Thus,  while  I  should  not  be  surprised,  if 


PEEFACE.  XIX 

Sanskrit  scholars  were  to  blame  me  for  having  left 
out  too  much,  students  of  philosophy  may  think  that 
there  is  really  too  much  of  the  same  subject,  dis- 
cussed again  and  again  in  the  six  different  schools. 
I  have  done  my  best,  little  as  it  may  be,  and  my  best 
reward  will  be  if  a  new  interest  shall  spring  up 
for  a  long  neglected  mine  of  philosophical  thought, 
and  if  my  own  book  were  soon  to  be  superseded  by 
a  more  complete  and  more  comprehensive  examina- 
tion of  Indian  philosophy. 

A  friend  of  mine,  a  native  of  India,  whom  I  con- 
sulted about  the  various  degrees  of  popularity  enjoyed 
at  the  present  day  by  different  systems  of  philosophy 
in  his  own  country,  informs  me  that  the  only  system 
that  can  now  be  said  to  be  living  in  India  is  the 
Vedanta  with  its  branches,  the  Advaitis,  the  Madh- 
vas,  the  Ramanu^as,  and  the  Vallabhas.  The  Ve- 
danta, being  mixed  with  religion,  he  writes,  has 
become  a  living  faith,  and  numerous  Pandits  can 
be  found  to-day  in  all  these  sects  who  have  learnt 
at  least  the  principal  works  by  heart  and  can 
expound  them,  such  as  the  Upanishads,  the  Brahma- 
Sutras,  the  great  Commentaries  of  the  A&aryas  and 
the  Bhagavad-gita.  Some  of  the  less  important 
treatises  also  are  studied,  such  as  the  Paw&adasl 
and  Yoga-Vasish^Aa.  The  Purva-Mlma/msa  is  still 
studied  in  Southern  India,  but  not  much  in  other 
parts,  although  expensive  sacrifices  are  occasionally 
performed.  The  Agnishfoma  was  performed  last 
year  at  Benares. 

Of  the  other  systems,  the  Nyaya  only  finds 
devotees,  especially  in  Bengal,  but  the  works  studied 
are  generally  the  later  controversial  treatises,  not 
the  earlier  ones. 

b2 


XX  PREFACE. 

The  Vaiseshika  is  neglected  and  so  is  the  Yoga, 
except  in  its  purely  practical  and  most  degenerate 
form. 

It  is  feared,  however,  that  even  this  small  remnant 
of  philosophical  learning  will  vanish  in  one  or  two 
generations,  as  the  youths  of  the  present  day,  even 
if  belonging  to  orthodox  Brahmanic  families,  do  not 
take  to  these  studies,  as  there  is  no  encouragement. 

But  though  we  may  regret  that  the  ancient 
method  of  philosophical  study  is  dying  out  in  India, 
we  should  welcome  all  the  more  a  new  class  of 
native  students  who,  after  studying  the  history  of 
European  philosophy,  have  devoted  themselves  to 
the  honorable  task  of  making  their  own  national 
philosophy  better  known  to  the  world  at  large. 
I  hope  that  my  book  may  prove  useful  to  them  by 
showing  them  in  what  direction  they  may  best  assist 
us  in  our  attempts  to  secure  a  place  to  thinkers 
such  as  Kapila  and  Badarayana  by  the  side  of 
the  leading  philosophers  of  Greece,  Rome,  Germany, 
France,  Italy,  and  England.  In  some  cases  the 
enthusiasm  of  native  students  may  seem  to  have 
carried  them  too  far,  and  a  mixing  up  of  philosophical 
with  religious  and  theosophic  propaganda,  inevitable 
as  it  is  said  to  be  in  India,  is  always  dangerous. 
But  such  journals  as  the  Pandit,  the  Brahmavddin, 
the  Liyht  of  Truth,  and  lately  the  Journal  of  the 
Buddhist  Text  Society,  have  been  doing  most  valu- 
able service.  What  we  want  are  texts  and  transla- 
tions, and  any  information  that  can  throw  light  on 
the  chronology  of  Indian  philosophy.  Nor  should 
their  labour  be  restricted  to  Sanskrit  texts.  In  the 
South  of  India  there  exists  a  philosophical  literature 
which,  though  it  may  show  clear  traces  of  Sanskrit 


PREFACE.  XXi 

influence,  contains  also  original  indigenous  elements 
of  great  beauty  and  of  great  importance  for  historical 
purposes.  Unfortunately  few  scholars  only  have 
taken  up,  as  yet,  the  study  of  the  Dravidian 
languages  and  literature,  but  young  students  who 
complain  that  there  is  nothing  left  to  do  in  Sanskrit 
literature,  would,  I  believe,  find  their  labours  amply 
rewarded  in  that  field.  How  much  may  be  done  in 
another  direction  by  students  of  Tibetan  literature 
in  furthering  a  study  of  Indian  philosophy  has  lately 
been  proved  by  the  publications  of  Sarat  Chandra 
Das,  C.I.E.,  and  Satis  Chandra  Achaiya  Vidya- 
bhushana,  M.A.,  and  their  friends. 

In  conclusion  I  have  to  thank  Mr.  A.  E.  Gough, 
the  translator  of  the  Vaiseshika-Sutras,  and  the 
author  of  the  'Philosophy  of  the  Upanishads,'  for  his 
extreme  kindness  in  reading  a  revise  of  my  proof- 
sheets.  A  man  of  seventy-six  has  neither  the  eyes 
nor  the  memory  which  he  had  at  twenty-six,  and  he 
may  be  allowed  to  appeal  to  younger  men  for  such 
help  as  he  himself  in  his  younger  days  has  often  and 
gladly  lent  to  his  Gurus  and  fellow-labourers. 

F.  M.  M. 

OXFORD, 
May  i,  1899. 


CONTENTS. 


INTEODUCTOEY  CHAPTEE. 

PAGE 

Philosophy  and  Philosophers         .....  i 

Sruti  and  Smnti  ........  3 

Upanishad-period,  from  about  700  B.  c.  .                           .  6 

Period  antecedent  to  the  Upanishads     ....  6 

Intellectual  Life  in  ancient  India  .....  9 

Kshatriyas  and  Brahmawas    .         .         .         .         .         .  1 1 

The  Evidence  of  the  Upanishads,  kanaka,  A^atasatru     .  14 

A^atasatru     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .  18 

Buddhist  Period    .         .          .         .         .         .         .          .  19 

Prasena^it  and  Bimbisara       .         .         .         .         .         .  21 

Brahma-^ala-sutta           .         .         .         .         .         .         .  21 

Mahabharata           ........  28 

Buddha         .........  30 

Greek  Accounts     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .  34 

Buddhist  Pilgrims,  Hiouen-thsang         ....  36 

King  Harsha          ...         ...  39 


CHAPTEE  II. 

THE  VEDAS. 

TheVedas 43 

The  Philosophical  Basis  of  the  Vedic  Gods    .  46 

Three  Classes  of  Vedic  Gods  ....  48 

Other  Classifications  of  Gods          ...  49 

The  Visve  or  All-gods    .         .         .         .         .  .         •          51 


XXIV  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Tendencies  towards  Unity  among  the  Gods    .         .         .  52 

Henotheism  .........  53 

Monotheism  and  Monism       .         .         .         .         .         .  53 

Pra^apati       .  55 

Visvakarman          ........  57 

Tvashfri        .         .         .......  57 

Search  for  a  Supreme  Deity  ......  59 

Hymn  to  the  Unknown  God           .....  60 

Brahman,  Atman,  Tad  Ekam         .         .         .         .         .  63 

Nasadiya  Hymn    .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .  64 

Brahman,  its  various  Meanings      .....  68 

Br?h  and  Brahman,  Word      .         .         .         .         .         .  72 

East  and  West 77 

Mind  and  Speech  ........  88 

Atman  ..........  93 

Pra^apati,  Brahman,  Atman           .         .         .         .         .  95 


CHAPTEE  III. 

THE  SYSTEMS  OF  PHILOSOPHY. 

Growth  of  Philosophical  Ideas  .  .  .  .  .         97 

Prasthana  Bheda   .         .         .  .  .  .  .  .         98 

Literary  References  in  the  Upanishads  .  .  .  .        1 1 1 

The  Six  Systems  of  Philosophy  .  .  .  .  1 1 1 

Bnhaspati-Sutras  .         .         .  .  .  .  .  .113 

Books  of  Reference         .          .  .  .  .  .  .114 

Dates  of  the  Philosophical  Sutras  .  .  .  .  .116 

Sawkhya-Sutras     .         .         .  .  .  .  .  .118 

Vedanta-Sutras       .         .         .  .  .  .  .  .119 

Mnemonic  Literature      .         .  .  .  .  .  .121 

The  Brihaspati- Philosophy     .  .  .  .  .  .123 

Common  Philosophical  Ideas  .  .  .  .  137 

1.  Metempsychosis — Sawisara  .  .  .  .  .137 

2.  Immortality  of  the  Soul    .  .  .  .  .  .138 

3.  Pessimism         .         .         .  .  .  .  .  .139 

4.  Karman     .         .         .         .  .  .  .  .  .143 

5.  Infallibility  of  the  Veda     .  .  .  .  .  .146 

6.  Three  Guwas      .         .         .  .  .  .  .  .146 


CONTENTS.  XXV 

CHAPTER  IV. 

VEDANTA  OR  UTTARA-MIMAA/SA. 

PAGE 

Vedanta  or  Uttara-Mimamsa  .         .         .         .  .148 

Badarayawa  .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         •       X53 

Fundamental  Doctrines  of  the  Vedanta .         .         .  159 

Translation  of  the  Upanishads        .         .         .         .         .179 

Character  of  the  Upanishads  .         .         .         .  .182 

Vedanta-Sutras      .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .184 

Appeals  to  the  Veda      .         .         .         .         .         .         .186 

Pramawas       .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .187 

Pramawas  according  to  the  Samkhya      .         .         .         .188 

Pratyaksha 188 

Anumana      .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .189 

Sabda    .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .190 

Authority  of  the  Vedas .         .         .         .         .         .         .195 

The  Meaning  of  Veda 195 

Work-part  and  Knowledge-part  of  the  Veda  .         .         .        198 
Vidya  and  Avidya          .         .         .         .         .         .  199 

Subject  and  Object          .         .         .         .         .         .  199 

The  Phenomenal  Keality  of  the  World  .         .         .         .       202 

Creation  or  Causation    .......       203 

Cause  and  Effect    ........        204 

Dreaming  and  Waking  .......        209 

The  Higher  and  the  Lower  Knowledge .          .         .         .        215 

Is  Virtue  Essential  to  Moksha  ?  .         .         .         .217 

The  Two  Brahmans       .         .         .         .          .         .         .220 

Philosophy  and  Religion         .         .         .         .          .         .224 

Karman          .....         .         .         .         .       224 

Brahman  is  Everything          .          .         .         .         .         .226 

The  Sthula-  and  Sukshma-sarira     .         .         .         .         .227 

The  Four  States 229 

Eschatology  .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .229 

Freedom  in  this  Life      .         .         .         .         .         .         .236 

Different  Ways  of  Studying  Philosophy          .         .         .        239 
Ramanuf/a      .........        243 

Metaphors      .........        255 


XXVI  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  V. 

PURVA-M!MAM8A. 

PAGH 

Purva-Mimawsa 258 

Contents  of  the  Purva-Mimamsa 263 

Pramawas  of  (?aimini     .         .         .         .         .         .         .265 

Sutra-style     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .266 

Has  the  Veda  a  Superhuman  Origin  ?     ....        270 

Supposed  Atheism  of  Purva-Mimamsa   .         .         .         .        275 

Is  the  Purva-Mimamsa  a  system  of  Philosophy?     .         .       279 

CHAPTER  VI. 

SAMKHYA-PHILOSOPHY. 

Samkhya-Philosophy       .         .         .         .         .         .         .281 

Later  Vedanta  mixed  with  Samkhya       .          .         .         .       281 

Relative  Age  of  Philosophies  and  Sutras         .         .         .286 
Age  of  the  Kapila-Sutras        ......        288 

Samkhya-karikas    .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .290 

Date  of  Gaudapada          .         .         .         .         .         .         .292 

Tattva-samasa         .         .         .         .         .         .         .          .294 

Anteriority  of  Vedanta  or  Samkhya         ....        ,-500 

Atheism  and  Orthodoxy         ......        303 

Authority  of  the  Veda  .......        305 

Samkhya  hostile  to  Priesthood        .....       306 

Parallel  development  of  Philosophical  Systems      .         .       307 
Buddhism  subsequent  to  Upanishads      ....       309 

Lalita-vistara         .         .         .         .          .         .         .          .310 

Asvaghosha's  Buddha-ftarita  .         .         .         .         .         .311 

Buddhist  Suttas    .         .          .          .          .          .          .          .312 

Asvalayana's  Gr/'hya-Sutras    .          .          .          .          .  313 

Did  Buddha  borrow  from  Kapila?          .         .          .         .       314 

Bana's  Harsha/oirita       .          .         .         .         .          .         .316 

The  Tattva-samasa          .         .         .         .         .          .         .318 

List  of  Twenty-five  Tattvas    .         .         .          .          .         .320 

The  Avyakta          .          .          .         .         .          .          .         .321 

Buddhi.          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .322 

Ahamkara      .........        326 

Five  Tanmatras      ....  .         .       328 


CONTENTS.  XXV11 

PAGE 

Sixteen  Vikaras     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -33° 

Five  Buddhindriyas        .         .         .         .         .         .         -33° 

Five  Karmendriyas         .         .         .         .         .         .         .330 

Manas   ..........       330 

Five  Mahabhutas  .         .         .         .         .         .  331 

Purusha         .         .          .         .         .         .         .         .         .331 

Is  Purusha  an  Agent  ?  .         .         .         .         .         .         .       334 

Three  Guwas .........       335 

Is  Purusha  one  or  many  ?      .         .         .         .         .         -335 

Vedanta  Sayings    .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -33^ 

Early  Eelation  between  Vedanta  and  Sawkhya       .         .       338 
Traiguwya      .         .  -343 

San&ara  and  Pratisaw&ara       .         .         .         .         .         -345 

Adhyatma,  Adhibhuta,  Adhidaivata       .         .         .         .       346 

Abhibuddhis  (5)     ........       348 

Karmayonis  (5)      ........       348 

Vayus  (5)  -35° 

Karmatmans  (5)    ........       350 

Avidya,  Nescience  (5)     .         .         .         .         .         .         •       351 

Asakti,  Weakness  (28)    .......       351 

Atushti  and  Tushft         .         .         .         .         .         .         -352 

Asiddhis  and  Siddhis     .......       352 

Tushfts  and  Siddhis 353 

Mulikarthas 354 

ShasbJi-tantra         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -355 

Anugraha-sarga      .          .         .         .         .         .         .         .356 

Bhuta-sarga  .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .  356 

Bandha,  Bondage  ........       357 

Dakshiwa-bondage,  Gifts  to  Priests          .          .         .         .        35? 

Moksha 358 

Pramawas       .........        358 

Du/ikha 359 

The  True  Meaning  of  the  Sawkhya         .         .         .         .360 

Nature  of  Pain       .         .         .         .         .         .          .         .361 

Vedanta  and  Samkhya  .         .         .         .         .         .         .366 

Vedanta,  Avidya,  and  Aviveka       .          .         .         .         .367 

Sawkhya,  Aviveka          .         .         .         .         .         .         .369 

Atman  and  Purusha       .         .         .         .         .         .         -374 

Origin  of  Avidya   ........        37^ 

The  Sastra     .  379 


XXViu  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Development  of  Prakn'ti,  Cosmic  .....       380 

Retrospect     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .381 

Is  Sawkhya  Idealism  ?  .         .         .         .         .         .         .       384 

Purusha  and  Prakriti 386 

State  of  Purusha,  when  Free          .....       387 

Meaning  of  Pain 389 

Purusha         .........       390 

Prakriti  an  Automaton  ?        .         .         .         .         .         .391 

Prakr/ti's  Unselfishness          .         .         .         .         .         .392 

Gross  and  Subtle  Body  .......       393 

The  Atheism  of  Kapila 395 

Immorality  of  the  Samkhya  .         .         .         .         .         -398 
Sawkhya  Parables .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -399 

CHAPTER  VII. 

YOGA-PHILOSOPHY. 

Yoga  and  Sawkhya         .         .         .         .         .         .         .402 

Meanings  of  the  word  Yoga   ......       404 

Yoga,  not  Union,  but  Disunion 405 

Yoga  as  Viveka     ........       407 

Pata%ali,  Vyasa    .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .410 

Second  Century  B.C.  .         .         .         .         .         .411 

Chronology  of  Thought  .         .         .         .         .         .412 

The  Yoga- Philosophy 415 

Misconception  of  the  Objects  of  Yoga     .         .         .         .416 

Devotion  to  Jsvara,  Misconceptions         .         .         .         .418 

What  is  Isvara  ?.         .         .         .         .         .         .         .421 

Kapila's  Real  Argument         .         .         .         .         .         .429 

The  Theory  of  Karman .         .         .         .         .         .         .432 

The  Four  Books  of  Yoga-Sutras 438 

True  Object  of  Yoga      .         .         .         .         .         .         .440 

Jfitta     ..........        440 

Functions  of  the  Mind  .         .         .         .         .          .         .442 

Exercises       .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .443 

Dispassion,  Vairagya      .         .         .         .         .         .         .444 

Meditation  With  or  Without  an  Object.         .         .         .       447 

U'vara  once  more   .         .         .         .         .         .          .         .450 

Other  Means  of  obtaining  Samadhi         .         .         .         .4^1 

Samadhi  Apnu//Vitii        .         .         .         .  .         .454 


CONTENTS.  XXIX 

PAGE 

Kaivalya,  Freedom         .         .         .         .         .         .         -455 

Yogangas,  Helps  to  Yoga      .         .         .         .         .         .456 

Vibhutis,  Powers  .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .458 

Sawyama  and  Siddhis    .         .         .         .         .         .         .459 

Miracles         .........       462 

True  Yoga     .........       466 

The  Three  Gunas 468 

Samskaras  and  Vasanas .         .         .         .         .         .         .469 

Kaivalya        .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .471 

Is  Yoga  Nihilism  ?         .         .         .         .         .         .         .471 

CHAPTER  VIII. 

NYAYA  AND  VAISESHIKA. 

Eelation  between  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika         .         .         .       474 
Dignaga         .........       476 

Bibliography          .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .481 

Nyaya-Philosophy          .......       484 

Summum  Bonum  .         .         .         .         .         .         .485 

Means  of  Salvation         .......       489 

The  Sixteen  Topics  or  Padarthas   .         .         .         .         .489 

Means  of  Knowledge      .         .         .         .         .         .         .490 

Objects  of  Knowledge    .         .         .         .         .         .         .491 

Padartha,  Object   .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .492 

Six  Padarthas  of  Vaiseshika  .         .         .         .         .         .493 

Madhava's  Account  of  Nyaya          .....       493 

I.  Pramawa  .........       496 

Perception  or  Pratyaksha       .         .         .         .         .         .496 

Inference  or  Anumana  .         .         .         .         .         .         .496 

Comparison  or  Anumana       .          .         .         .         .         .500 

Word  or  £abda 500 

II.  Prameya          .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .501 

III.  Samsaya          ........       504 

IV.  Prayof/ana.     V.  Dn'shfanta.     VI.  Siddhanta .         .       504 

VII.  The  Avayavas,  or  Members  of  a  Syllogism    .         .       504 
Indian  and  Greek  Logic          ......       505 

VIII.  Tarka 508 

IX.  Nimaya          ........       509 

X-XVI.     Vada,     6ralpa,    Vitawc?a,    Hetvabhasa,     Gati, 

,,  Nigrahasthana      ......       509 


XXX  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 
Judgments  on  Indian  Logic   .         .         .         .         .         .510 

The  Later  Books  of  the  Nyaya 513 

Time — Present,  Past,  Future 515 

Upamana,  Comparison  .         .         .  .         .         .516 

£abda,  the  Word 516 

The  Eight  Pramawas 518 

Thoughts  on  Language .         ......       520 

Sphofa 527 

Words  express  the  Summum  Genus  ....  530 
Words  expressive  of  Genera  or  Individuals?  .  .  532 
All  Words  mean  TO  ov  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  532 

Vedanta  on  Sphofa 536 

Yoga  and  Sawkhya  on  Sphofo 539 

Nyaya  on  Spho£a  ...          .....       542 

Vaiseshika  on  Sphofa 543 

Prameyas,  Objects  of  Knowledge  .  .  .  .  .544 
Indriyas.  Senses  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  -545 

£arira,  Body 545 

Manas,  Mind.         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .       546 

Atman  ..........       549 

Memory         .........       549 

Knowledge  not  Eternal .         .         .         .         .         .         -552 

More  Prameyas      ........       552 

Life  after  Death 553 

Existence  of  Deity          .         .         .         .         .         .         -553 

Cause  and  Effect    ........       555 

Phala,  Rewards     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -556 

Emancipation         .         .         .         .         .         .         .         -557 

Knowledge  of  Ideas,  not  of  Things         ....       559 

Syllogism       .........       560 

Pramawas  in  different  Philosophical  Schools  .  .  .  562 
Anumana  for  Others  .  .  .  .  .  .  -565 


CHAPTER  IX. 

VAI.VESIIIKA  PHILOSOPHY. 

Date  of  Sutras        ........       574 

Dates  from  Tibetan  Sources  .         .         .         .         .         -576 

Kawada 577 


CONTENTS.  XXxi 

PAGE 

Substances    .........  578 

Qualities 578 

Actions          .........  579 

Cause     ..........  580 

Qualities  Examined        .         .         .         .         .         .         .581 

Time 582 

Space    .........         .  582 

Manas  ..........  583 

Amis  or  Atoms     ........  584 

Samanya 586 

"Vlsesha 586 

Sama>vaya 586 

Abhava         .........  587 

The  Six  Systems  ........  589 


INDIAN   PHILOSOPHY. 


INTRODUCTORY  CHAPTER. 

Philosophy  and  Philosophers. 

WHILE  in  most  countries  a  history  of  philosophy 
is  inseparable  from  a  history  of  philosophers,  in 
India  we  have  indeed  ample  materials  for  watching 
the  origin  and  growth  of  philosophical  ideas,  but 
hardly  any  for  studying  the  lives  or  characters 
of  those  who  founded  or  supported  the  philosophical 
systems  of  that  country.  Their  work  has  remained 
and  continues  to  live  to  the  present  day,  but  of  the 
philosophers  themselves  hardly  anything  remains  to 
us  beyond  their  names.  Not  even  their  dates  can 
be  ascertained  with  any  amount  of  certainty.  In 
Greece,  from  the  earliest  times,  the  simplest  views 
of  the  world  and  of  the  destinies  of  man,  nay  even 
popular  sayings,  maxims  of  morality  and  worldly 
wisdom,  and  wise  saws  of  every  kind,  even  though 
they  contained  nothing  very  original  or  personal, 
were  generally  quoted  as  the  utterances  of  certain 
persons  or  at  least  ascribed  to  certain  names,  such 
as  the  Seven  Sages,  so  as  to  have  something  like 
a  historical  background.  We  have  some  idea  of  who 

B 


2  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Thales  was,  and  who  was  Plato,  where  and  when 
they  lived,  and  what  they  did  ;  but  of  Kapila, 
the  supposed  founder  of  the  S&mkhya  philosophy, 
of  Pata/l^ali,  the  founder  of  the  Yoga,  of  Gotama 
and  Ka?iada,  of  Badarayawa  and  6raimini,  we 
know  next  to  nothing,  and  what  we  know  hardly 
ever  rests  on  contemporary  and  trustworthy  evi- 
dence. Whether  any  of  these  Indian  philosophers 
lived  at  the  same  time  and  in  the  same  place, 
whether  they  were  friends  or  enemies,  whether 
some  were  the  pupils  and  others  the  teachers, 
all  this  is  unknown  to  us,  nor  do  I  see  any 
chance  of  our  ever  knowing  more  about  them 
than  we  do  at  present.  We  read  that  Thales 
warned  King  Croesus,  we  are  told  that  Empedocles 
finished  his  days  by  throwing  himself  into  the  flames 
of  Aetna,  we  know  that  Socrates  drank  poison,  and 
that  Anaxagoras  was  the  friend  of  Pericles,  but 
there  is  nothing  to  connect  the  names  of  the  ancient 
Indian  philosophers  with  any  historical  events,  with 
any  political  characters,  or  with  dates  before  the 
time  of  Buddha. 

It  is  quite  true  that  every  literary  composition, 
whether  in  prose  or  in  poetry,  presupposes  an 
individual  author,  that  no  poem  makes  itself,  and 
no  philosophical  system  is  elaborated  by  the  people 
at  large.  But  on  the  other  hand,  no  poet  makes 
himself,  no  philosopher  owes  everything  to  himself. 
He  grows  from  a  soil  that  is  ready  made  for  him, 
and  he  breathes  an  intellectual  atmosphere  which  is 
not  of  his  own  making.  The  Hindus  seem  to  have 
felt  this  indebtedness  of  the  individuals  to  those 
before  and  around  them  far  more  strongly  than 
the  Greeks,  who,  if  they  cannot  find  a  human 


SRUTAM    AND    SMfl/TAM.  3 

author,  have  recourse  even  to  mythological  arid 
divine  personages  in  order  to  have  a  pedestal, 
a  name,  and  an  authority  for  every  great  thought 
and  every  great  invention  of  antiquity.  The 
Hindus  are  satisfied  with  giving  us  the  thoughts, 
and  leave  us  to  find  out  their  antecedents  as  best 
we  can. 

$rutam  and  Smntam. 

The  Hindus  have  divided  the  whole  of  their 
ancient  literature  into  two  parts,  which  really  mean 
two  periods,  $rutam,  what  was  heard,  and  was 
not  the  work  of  men  or  any  personal  being,  human 
or  divine,  and  Smr^tam,  what  was  remembered, 
and  has  always  been  treated  as  the  work  of  an 
individual,  whether  man  or  god.  $rutam  or 
/Sruti  came  afterwards  to  mean  what  has  been 
revealed,  exactly  as  we  understand  that  word, 
while  Srmntam  or  Smriti  comprised  all  that  was 
recognized  as  possessing  human  authority  only,  so 
that  if  there  ever  was  a  conflict  between  the  two, 
Snmti  or  tradition  might  at  once  be  overruled  by 
what  was  called  $ruti  or  revelation. 

It  is  curious,  however,  to  observe  how  the 
revealed  literature  of  the  Hindus,  such  as  the 
hymns  of  the  Rig-veda,  have  in  later  times  been 
ascribed  to  certain  families,  nay  even  to  individual 
poets,  though  many  of  the  names  of  these  poets  are 
clearly  fictitious.  Nor  are  even  these  fictitious 
poets  supposed  to  have  created  or  composed  their 
poems,  but  only  to  have  seen  them  as  they  were 
revealed  to  them  by  a  higher  power,  commonly 
called  Brahman,  or  the  Word.  What  we  call  philo- 
sophy in  its  systematic  form,  is,  from  an  Indian 

B  2 


4  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

point  of  view,  not  revealed,  /Srutam,  but  belongs 
to  Smriti  or  tradition.  We  possess  it  in  carefully 
composed  and  systematically  elaborated  manuals,  in 
short  aphorisms  or  Sutras  or  in  metrical  Karikas, 
ascribed  to  authors  of  whom  we  hardly  know 
anything,  and  followed  by  large  commentaries  or 
independent  treatises  which  are  supposed  to  contain 
the  outcome  of  a  continuous  tradition  going  back 
to  very  ancient  times,  to  the  Sutra,  nay  even  to  the 
Brahmana  period,  though  in  their  present  form  they 
are  confessedly  the  work  of  medieval  or  modern 
writers.  In  the  Sutras  each  system  of  philosophy 
is  complete,  and  elaborated  in  its  minutest  details. 
There  is  no  topic  within  the  sphere  of  philosophy 
which  does  not  find  a  clear  or  straightforward  treat- 
ment in  these  short  Sutras.  The  Sutra  style,  im- 
perfect as  it  is  from  a  literary  point  of  view,  would 
be  invaluable  to  us  in  other  systems  of  philosophy, 
such  as  Hegel's  or  Plato's.  We  should  always  know 
where  we  are,  and  we  should  never  hear  of  a  philoso- 
pher who  declared  on  his  deathbed  that  no  one  had 
understood  him,  nor  of  antagonistic  schools,  diverg- 
ing from  and  appealing  to  the  same  teacher.  One 
thing  must  be  quite  clear  to  every  attentive  reader 
of  these  Sutras,  namely,  that  they  represent  the  last 
result  of  a  long  continued  study  of  philosophy, 
carried  on  for  centuries  in  the  forests  and  hermitages 
of  India.  The  ideas  which  are  shared  by  all  the 
systems  of  Indian  philosophy,  the  large  number  of 
technical  terms  possessed  by  them  in  common  or 
peculiar  to  each  system,  can  leave  no  doubt  on 
this  subject.  Nor  can  we  doubt  that  for  a  long 
time  the  philosophical  thoughts  of  India  were 
embodied  in  what  I  call  a  Mnemonic  Literature. 


MNEMONIC    LITERATURE.  5 

Writing  for  literary  purposes  was  unknown  in  India 
before  the  rise  of  Buddhism,  and  even  at  the  Bud- 
dhist Councils  when  their  Sacred  Canon,  the  Tripkaka, 
was  settled,  we  hear  nothing  as  yet  of  paper,  ink,  and 
reeds,  but  only  of  oral  and  even  musical  repetition. 
The  very  name  of  a  Council  was  Samgiti  or  Maha- 
sawgiti,  i.  e.  singing  together,  and  the  different  parts 
of  the  Canon  were  not  consigned  to  writing,  but 
rehearsed  by  certain  individuals.  Whenever  there 
arose  a  dispute  as  to  the  true  teaching  of  Buddha, 
it  was  not  settled  by  an  appeal  to  any  MS.,  but  an 
invitation  was  addressed  to  a  member  of  the  Samgha 
who  knew  the  text  by  heart.  It  is  actually  men- 
tioned that  the  Southern  Canon  was  not  reduced  to 
writing  till  the  first  century  B.C.,  under  King  Va^a- 
gamani,  about  80  B.  c.  Nothing  can  be  more  explicit 
than  the  statement  in  the  chronicles  of  Ceylon  on 
that  point :  '  Before  this  time  the  wise  monks  had 
handed  down  the  texts  of  the  Tipkaka  orally;  and 
also  the  A^Aakatha  (commentary).  At  this  time 
the  monks,  perceiving  the  decay  of  beings  (not 
MSS.),  assembled,  and  in  order  that  the  Law  might 
endure  for  a  long  time,  they  caused  it  to  be  written 
down  in  books.'  Such  a  state  of  things  is  difficult 
for  us  to  imagine,  still  if  we  wish  to  form  a  true 
idea  of  the  intellectual  state  of  India  in  pre-Bud- 
dhistic  times,  we  must  accustom  ourselves  to  the 
idea  that  all  that  could  be  called  literature  then  was 
mnemonic  only,  carefully  guarded  by  a  peculiar  and 
very  strict  educational  discipline,  but  of  course 
exposed  to  all  the  inevitable  chances  of  oral  tradi- 
tion. That  Mnemonic  Period  existed  for  philosophy 
as  well  as  for  everything  else,  and  if  we  have  to 
begin  our  study  of  Indian  philosophy  with  the 


6  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Sutras,  these  Sutras  themselves  must  be  considered 
as  the  last  outcome  of  a  long  continued  philosophical 
activity  carried  on  by  memory  only. 

TJpanishad-period,  from  about  700  B.C. 

But  while  the  Sutras  give  us  abstracts  of  the 
various  systems  of  philosophy,  ready  made,  there 
must  have  been,  nay  there  was,  one  period,  previous 
to  the  Sutras,  during  which  we  can  watch  something 
like  growth,  like  life  and  strife,  in  Indian  philosophy, 
and  that  is  the  last  stage  of  the  Vedic  period,  as 
represented  to  us  in  the  Upanishads. 

For  gaining  an  insight  into  the  early  growth  of 
Indian  philosophic  thought,  this  period  is  in  fact  the 
most  valuable  ;  though  of  systematised  philosophy, 
in  our  sense  of  the  word,  it  contains,  as  yet,  little  or 
nothing.  As  we  can  feel  that  there  is  electricity  in 
the  air,  and  that  there  will  be  a  storm,  we  feel,  on 
reading  the  Upanishads,  that  there  is  philosophy  in 
the  Indian  mind,  and  that  there  will  be  thunder 
and  lightning  to  follow  soon.  Nay,  I  should  even  go 
a  step  further.  In  order  to  be  able  to  account  for  what 
seem  to  us  mere  sparks  of  thought,  mere  guesses  at 
truth,  we  are  driven  to  admit  a  long  familiarity 
with  philosophic  problems  before  the  time  that  gave 
birth  to  the  Upanishads  which  we  possess. 

Period  antecedent  to  the  Upanishads. 

The  Upanishads  contain  too  many  technical 
terms,  such  as  Brahman,  Atman,  Dharma,  Yrata, 
Yoga,  Mimjimsa,  and  many  more,  to  allow  us  to  sup- 
pose that  they  were  the  products  of  one  day  or  of  one 
generation.  Even  if  the  later  systems  of  philosophy 
did  not  so  often  appeal  themselves  to  the  Upanishads 


UPANISHAD-PERIOD.  J 

as  their  authorities,  we  could  easily  see  for  ourselves 
that,  though  flowing  in  very  different  directions, 
like  the  Ganges  and  the  Indus,  these  systems  of 
philosophy  can  all  be  traced  back  to  the  same  distant 
heights  from  which  they  took  their  rise.  And  as 
India  was  fertilised,  not  only  by  the  Ganges  and 
Indus,  but  by  ever  so  many  rivers  and  rivulets,  all 
pointing  to  the  Snowy  Mountains  in  the  North,  we 
can  see  the  Indian  mind  also  being  nourished  through 
ever  so  many  channels,  all  starting  from  a  vast 
accumulation  of  religious  and  philosophic  thought  of 
which  we  seem  to  see  the  last  remnants  only  in  our 
Upanishads,  while  the  original  springs  are  lost  to  us 
for  ever. 

If  some  of  the  seeds  and  germs  of  philosophy  could 
be  discovered,  as  has  been  hastily  thought,  among  the 
savage  tribes  of  to-day,  nothing  would  be  more  wel- 
come to  the  historian  of  philosophy,  but  until  these 
tribes  have  been  classified  according  to  language,  we 
must  leave  these  dangerous  enterprises  to  others.  For 
the  present  we  must  be  satisfied  with  the  germs  of 
thought  such  as  we  find  them  in  the  Upanishads, 
and  in  the  archives  of  language  which  reach  back  far 
beyond  the  Upanishads  and  even  beyond  the  folklore 
of  Khonds,  Bhils,  and  Koles. 

It  is  true  that  during  that  distant  period  which 
we  can  watch  in  the  Upanishads,  philosophy  was 
not  yet  separated  from  religion  ;  but  the  earliest 
religion,  at  least  among  the  speakers  of  Aryan 
languages,  seems  always  to  have  been  not  only  the 
first  religion,  but  the  first  philosophy  also,  of  the 
races  that  had  taken  possession  of  India,  as  well  as 
of  the  best  soil  of  Asia  and  Europe.  If  it  is  the  object 
of  philosophy  to  discover  the  causes  of  things,  rerum 


8  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

cognoscere   causas,  what  was  the  creation    of  the 
earliest  mythological   gods  but  an  attempt  to  ex- 
plain the  causes  of  light,  of  fire,  of  dawn,  of  day  and 
night,  of  rain  and  thunder,  by  postulating  agents  for 
every   one    of  them,    and    calling    them  Dyaus   or 
Agni,  light  or  fire,  Ushas,  dawn,  the  Asvins,  day 
and  night,  Indra,  the  sky-god,  and  calling  all  of 
them  Devas,  the  Bright,  or  dii,  the  gods  ?     Here  are 
the  first  feeders  of  the  idea  of  the  Godhead,  what- 
ever tributaries  it   may  have  received  afterwards. 
Of  course,  that  distant  period  to  which  we  have  to 
assign  this    earliest  growth   of  language,  thought, 
religion,  law,  morals,  and  philosophy,  has  left  us  no 
literary  monuments.     Here  and  there  we  can  dis- 
cover faint  traces  in  language,  indicating  the  foot- 
prints left  by  the  strides  of  former  giants.     But  in 
India,  where  we  have  so  little  to  guide  us  in  our 
historical   researches,   it  is   of  great    importance  to 
remember  that  there  was  such  a  distant  period  of 
nascent  thought ;   and  that,  if  at  a  later  time  we 
meet  with  the  same  ideas  and  words  turning  up  in 
different  systems,  whether  of  religion  or  philosophy, 
we  should  be  careful  not  to  conclude  at  once  that 
they  must  have  been  borrowed  by  one  system  from 
the  other,  forgetting  that  there  was  an  ancient  re- 
servoir of  thought  from  which  all  could  have  drawn 
and  drunk. 

Considering  how  small  our  historical  information 
is  as  to  the  intellectual  and  social  life  of  India  at 
different  times  of  its  history,  it  is  essential  that  we 
should  carefully  gather  whatever  there  is,  before^we 
attempt  to  study  Indian  philosophy  in  its  differen- 
tiated and  systematised  systems.  Much  of  our  in- 
formation may  represent  a  chaos  only,  but  we  wrant 


INTELLECTUAL    LIFE    IN    ANCIENT    INDIA.  9 

such    a  chaos  in  order  to  understand  the   kosmos 
that  followed. 

Intellectual  Life  in  ancient  India. 

In  certain  chapters  of  the  Brahmanas  and  in 
the  Upanishads  we  see  a  picture  of  the  social  and 
intellectual  life  of  India  at  that  early  time,  which 
seems  fully  to  justify  the  saying  that  India  has 
always  been  a  nation  of  philosophers.  The  picture 
which  these  sacred  books  give  us  of  the  seething 
thoughts  of  that  country  may  at  first  sight  seem 
fanciful  and  almost  incredible  ;  but  because  the  men 
of  ancient  India,  as  they  are  there  represented  to 
us,  if  by  tradition  only,  are  different  from  Greeks 
and  Romans  and  from  ourselves,  it  does  not  follow 
that  we  have  not  before  us  a  faithful  account  of 
what  really  existed  at  one  time  in  the  land  of  the 
Five  or  Seven  Rivers.  Why  should  these  accounts 
have  been  invented,  unless  they  contained  a  certain 
verisimilitude  in  the  eyes  of  the  people  ?  It  is 
quite  clear  that  they  were  not  composed,  as  some 
people  seem  to  imagine,  in  order  to  impose  after 
two  thousands  of  years  on  us,  the  scholars  of 
Europe,  or  on  anybody  else.  The  idea  that  the 
ancient  nations  of  the  world  wished  to  impose  on 
us,  that  they  wished  to  appear  more  ancient  than 
they  were,  more  heroic,  more  marvellous,  more 
enlightened,  is  an  absurd  fancy.  They  did  not 
even  think  of  us,  and  had  no  word  as  yet  for 
posterity.  Such  thoughts  belong  to  much  later 
times,  and  even  then  we  wonder  rather  how  a  local, 
not  to  say,  provincial  poet  like  Horace  should  have 
thought  so  much  of  ages  to  come.  We  must  not 
allow  such  ideas  of  fraud  and  forgery  to  spoil  our 


10  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

faith  and  our  interest  in  ancient  history.  The 
ancients  thought  much  more  of  themselves  than 
of  the  nations  of  the  distant  future.  If,  however, 
what  the  ancients  tell  us  about  their  own  times, 
or  about  the  past  which  could  never  have  extended 
very  far  back,  seems  incredible  to  us,  we  should 
always  try  first  of  all  to  understand  it  as  possible, 
before  we  reject  it  as  impossible  and  as  an  inten- 
tional fraud.  That  in  very  early  times  kings  and 
nobles  and  sages  in  India  should  have  been  absorbed 
in  philosophical  questions  seems  no  doubt  strange 
to  us,  because  the  energies  of  the  people  of  Europe, 
as  far  back  as  we  know  anything  about  them,  have 
always  been  divided  between  practical  and  intel- 
lectual pursuits,  the  former,  in  ancient  times,  con- 
siderably preponderating  over  the  latter.  But  why 
should  not  a  different  kind  of  life  have  been  possible 
in  a  country  which,  without  much  effort  on  the  part 
of  its  cultivators,  yielded  in  abundance  all  that  was 
necessary  for  the  support  of  life,  which  was  pro- 
tected on  three  sides  by  the  silver  streaks  of  the 
ocean,  and  on  the  fourth  by  almost  impassable 
mountain  barriers,  a  country  which  for  thousands 
of  years  was  free  from  wrar  except  the  war  of  ex- 
termination directed  against  barbarous  tribes,  the 
so-called  sons  of  the  soil  ?  After  all,  to  thoughtful 
people,  finding  themselves  placed  on  this  planet,  they 
did  not  know  how  or  why,  it  was  not  so  very  far- 
fetched a  problem,  particularly  while  there  was  as  yet 
no  struggle  for  life,  to  ask  who  they  were,  whence 
they  came,  and  what  they  were  intended  for  here 
on  earth.  Thus  we  read  at  the  beginning  of  the 
iS'veta.s'vatara-upanishad  :  '  Whence  are  we  born  ? 
Whereby  do  we  live,  and  whither  do  we  go  ?  O  ye 


KSHATRIYAS    AND    BRAHMANS.  II 

who  know  Brahman,  (tell  us)  at  whose  command  we 
abide  here,  whether  in  pain  or  in  pleasure  ?  Should 
time  or  nature,  or  necessity,  or  chance,  or  the  ele- 
ments be  considered  as  the  cause,  or  He  who  is  called 
Purusha,  the  man,  that  is,  the  Supreme  Spirit l  ? ' 

Kshatriyas  and  Brahmans. 

It  might  be  thought  that  all  this  was  due  to  the 
elevating  influence  of  an  intellectual  aristocracy, 
such  as  we  find  from  very  early  times  to  the  pre- 
sent day  in  India,  the  Brahmans.  But  this  is  by 
no  means  the  case.  The  so-called  Kshatriyas  or 
military  nobility  take  nearly  as  active  a  part  in  the 
intellectual  life  of  the  country  as  the  Brahmans 
themselves.  The  fact  is  that  we  have  to  deal  in 
the  earlier  period  of  ancient  India  with  two  rather 
than  with  four  castes  and  their  numerous  sub- 
divisions. 

This  term  caste  has  proved  most  mischievous  and  . 
misleading,  and  the  less  we  avail  ourselves  of  it 
the  better  we  shall  be  able  to  understand  the  true  ! 
state  of  society  in  the  ancient  times  of  India. 
Caste  is,  of  course,  a  Portuguese  word,  and  was 
applied  from  about  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth 
century  by  rough  Portuguese  sailors  to  certain 
divisions  of  Indian  society  which  had  struck  their 
fancy.  It  had  before  been  used  in  the  sense  of 
breed  or  stock,  originally  in  the  sense  of  a  pure  or 
unmixed  breed.  In  1613  Purchas  speaks  of  the 
thirty  and  odd  several  castes  of  the  Banians  (Vani</). 
To  ask  what  caste  means  in  India  would  be  like 
asking  what  caste  means  in  England,  or  what  fetish 

1  See  also  Anugita,  chap.  XX  ;  S.  B.  E.,  VIII,  p.  311. 


12  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

(feiti9o)  means  in  Portugal.  What  we  really  want 
to  know  is  what  was  implied  by  such  Indian  words  as 
Varaa  (colour),  6rati  (kith),  to  say  nothing  of  $&pind- 
atya  or  Samanodakatva,  Kula  (family),  Gotra  (race), 
Pravara  (lineage) ;  otherwise  we  shall  have  once  more 
the  same  confusion  about  the  social  organisation  of 
ancient  India  as  about  African  fetishism  or  North 
American  totemism !  Each  foreign  word  should 
always  be  kept  to  its  own  native  meaning,  or,  if 
generalised  for  scientific  purposes,  it  should  be  most 
carefully  defined  afresh.  Otherwise  every  social 
distinction  will  be  called  caste,  every  stick  a  totem, 
every  idol  a  fetish. 

We  have  in  India  the  Aryan  settlers  on  one  side, 
and  the  native  inhabitants  on  the  other.  The 
former  are  named  Aryas  or  Aryas,  that  is,  culti- 
vators of  the  soil  which  they  had  conquered ;  the 
latter,  if  submissive  to  their  conquerors,  are  the 
>Sudras  ]  or  Dasas,  slaves,  while  the  races  of  indi- 
genous origin  who  remained  hostile  to  the  end,  were 
classed  as  altogether  outside  the  pale  of  political 
society.  The  Aryas  in  India  were  naturally 
differentiated  like  other  people  into  an  intellectual 
or  priestly  aristocracy,  the  Brahmans,  and  a  fighting 
or  ruling  aristocracy,  the  Kshatriyas,  while  the 
great  bulk  remained  simply  Vis  or  VaLvyas,  that  is, 
householders  and  cultivators  of  the  soil,  and  after- 
wards merchants  and  mechanics  also.  To  the  very 
last  the  three  great  divisions,  Brahmans,  Kshatriyas, 


1  Thus  we  read  as  early  as  the  Mahabhanita— '  The  three 
qualities  abide  in  the  three  castes  thus  :  darkness  in  the  »S'udra. 
passion  in  the  Kshatriya,  and  the  highest,  goodness,  in  the 
Brahmami.'  (Anugita,  S.  B.  E.,VIII,  p.  329.) 


CASTES.  13 

and  Vaisyas,  shared  certain  privileges  and  duties 
in  common.  Originally  they  were  all  of  them  called 
twice-born,  and  not  only  allowed,  but  obliged  to  be 
educated  in  Vedic  knowledge  and  to  pass  through  the 
three  or  four  Asramas  or  stages  of  life.  Thus  we  read 
in  the  Mahabharata :  '  The  order  of  Vanaprasthas, 
of  sages  who  dwell  in  forests  and  live  011  fruits, 
roots,  and  air  is  prescribed  for  the  three  twice-born 
(classes) ;  the  order  of  householders  is  prescribed 
for  all.'  (Anugita,  S.  B.E.,VIII,  p.  316.)  While  the 
division  into  Aryas  and  Dasas  was  due  to  descent, 
that  into  Brahmans,  Kshatriyas,  and  Vaisyas  seems  ^i  I  ^ 
originally  to  have  been  due  to  occupation  only, 
though  it  may  soon  have  acquired  an  hereditary 
character.  The  Brahmans  had  to  look  after  the 
welfare  of  souls,  the  Kshatriyas  after  the  welfare 
of  the  body  politic,  and  the  Vaisyas  represented 
originally  the  undifterentiated  mass  of  the  people, 
engaged  in  the  ordinary  occupations  of  an  incipient 
civilisation.  The  later  subdivision  of  Indian 
society,  as  described  by  Manu,  and  as  preserved 
under  different  forms  to  the  present  day,  does  not 
concern  us  for  our  present  purpose.  The  lessons 
which  the  names  of  Varwa  (colour)  and  G&ti  (genus) 
teach  us  had  long  been  forgotten  even  in  Manu's 
time,  and  are  buried  at  present  under  a  heavy  heap 
of  rubbish.  Still  even  that  rubbish  heap  deserves  to 
be  sifted,  as  I  believe  it  is  now  being  sifted  by 
scholars  like  Mr.  Bisley  and  others. 

In  ancient  times  neither  Kshatriyas  nor  Vaisyas 
were  excluded  from  taking  part  in  those  religious 
and  philosophical  struggles,  which  seem  to  have 
occupied  India  far  more  than  wars  of  defence  or 
conquest.  Nay  women  also  claimed  a  right  to  be 


14  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

heard  in  their  philosophical  assemblies.  The  Ksha- 
triyas  never  surrendered  their  right  to  take  part 
in  the  discussions  of  the  great  problems  of  life  and 
death,  and  they  occasionally  asserted  it  with  great 
force  and  dignity.  Besides,  the  strong  reaction 
against  priestly  supremacy  came  at  last  from  them, 
for  we  must  not  forget  that  Buddha  also  was  a 
Kshatriya,  a  prince  of  Kapilavastu,  and  that  his 
chief  opposition,  from  a  social  and  political  point 
of  view,  was  against  the  privileges  of  teaching 
and  sacrificing,  claimed  by  the  Brahmans  as  their 
exclusive  property,  and  against  the  infallible  and 
divine  character  ascribed  by  them  to  their  Vedas. 


The  Evidence  of  the  Upanishads,  Ganaka,  A^atasatru. 

If  we  look  back  once  more  to  the  intellectual  life 
of  India  in  the  ancient  Vedic  times,  or  at  least  in 
the  times  represented  to  us  in  the  Upanishads, 
we  read  there  of  an  ancient  King  kanaka,  whose 
fame  at  the  time  when  the  Upanishads  were 
composed  had  already  spread  far  and  wide  (Kaush. 
Up.  IV,  i  ;  Brih.  Ar.  Up.  II,  i ,  i ).  He  was  a  king 
of  the  Videhas,  his  capital  was  Mithila,  and  his 
daughter,  Sita,  is  represented  to  us  in  later  times  as 
the  famous  wife  of  Rama  (Ramapurvatap.  Up.).  But 
in  the  Upanishads  he  is  represented,  not  as  a 
successful  general  or  conqueror,  not  so  much  as 
a  brave  knight,  victorious  in  chivalrous  tournaments. 
We  read  of  him  as  taking  part  in  metaphysical 
discussions,  as  presiding  over  philosophical  councils, 
as  bestowing  his  patronage  on  the  most  eminent 
sages  of  his  kingdom,  as  the  friend  of  Yagwavalkya, 
one  of  the  most  famous  philosophical  teachers  of 


KING    GANAKA.  15 

the  Upanishad  period.  When  performing1  a  great 
sacrifice,  this  king  sets  apart  a  day  for  a  Brah- 
modyam,  a  disputation  in  which  philosophers,  such 
as  Yagwavalkya,  Asvala,  Artabhaga,  and  even 
women,  such  as  Gargi,  the  daughter  of  VMaknu 
(Brih.  Ar.  Up.  Ill,  i,  5),  take  an  active  part.  To 
the  victor  in  these  disputations  the  king  promised 
a  reward  of  a  thousand  cows  with  ten  padas  of 
gold  fixed  to  their  horns.  As  Yagwavalkya  claimed 
these  cows  on  account  of  his  superior  knowledge, 
the  other  Brahmans  present  propounded  a  number 
of  questions  which  he  was  expected  to  answer  in 
order  to  prove  his  superiority.  And  so  he  does. 
The  first  question  is  how  a  man  who  offers  a  sacrifice 
can  be  freed  thereby  from  the  fetters  of  death. 
Then  follow  questions  such  as,  While  death  swallows 
the  whole  world,  who  is  the  deity  that  shall  swallow 
death  ?  What  becomes  of  the  vital  spirits  when 
a  man  dies  ?  What  is  it  that  does  not  forsake 
man  in  the  hour  of  death  ?  What  becomes  of 
man  after  his  speech  at  death  has  entered  the 
fire,  his  breath  the  wind,  his  eye  the  sun,  his 
mind  the  moon,  his  ear  space,  his  body  the  earth, 
his  Atman  the  ether,  the  hairs  of  his  body  the 
herbs,  the  hair  of  his  head  the  trees,  his  blood  and 
seed  the  waters  ?  Whither  did  the  descendants  of 
King  Parikshit  go  ?  What  is  the  soul  ?  What 
contains  the  worlds  1  Who  rules  everything  and 
yet  is  different  from  everything  ?  Far  be  it  from 
me  to  say  that  these  and  other  questions  were 
answered  by  Yagwavalkya  in  a  manner  that  would 
seem  satisfactory  to  ourselves.  What  is  important 

1  Kaushitaki  Up.  IV,  i ;  Bhh.  Ar.  Up.  Ill,  i. 


l6  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

to  us  is  that  such  questions  should  have  been  asked 
at  all,  that  they  should  have  formed  the  staple  of 
public  discussion  at  that  early  time,  a  time  previous 
to  the  establishment  of  Buddha's  religion  in  India, 
in  the  fifth  century  B.C.,  and  that  his  answers  should 
have  satisfied  his  contemporaries.  There  is  no  other 
country  in  the  world  where  in  such  ancient  times 
such  disputations  would  have  been  thought  of, 
unless  it  were  in  Egypt.  Neither  Menelaos  nor 
Priam  would  have  presided  over  them,  neither 
Achilles  nor  Ulysses  would  have  shone  in  them. 
That  these  disputations  took  place  in  public  and 
in  the  presence  of  the  king  we  have  no  reason  to 
doubt.  Besides,  there  is  one  passage  (Brih.  Ar. 
Up.  Ill,  2,  13)  where  we  are  told  expressly  that 
the  two  disputants,  Ya^/navalkya  and  Artabhaga, 
retired  into  a  private  place  in  order  to  come  to 
an  understanding  about  one  question  which,  as 
they  thought,  did  not  admit  of  being  discussed 
in  public. 

Do  we  know  of  any  other  country  where  at  that 
early  time  such  religious  congresses  would  have 
been  thought  of,  and  royal  rewards  bestowed  on 
those  who  were  victorious  in  these  philosophical 
tournaments  ? 

One  of  the  sayings  of  kanaka  has  remained 
famous  in  Indian  literature  for  ever,  and  deserves 
to  remain  so.  When  his  capital,  Mithila,  was  de- 
stroyed by  a  conflagration,  he  turned  round  and 
said, '  While  Mithila  is  burning,  nothing  that  is  mine 
is  burnt.' 

Very  curious  is  another  feature,  that,  namely,  in 
these  public  assemblies  not  only  was  a  royal  reward 
bestowed  on  the  victor,  but  the  vanquished  was 


KING    KANAKA.  17 

sometimes  threatened  with  losing  his  head  l.  Nor 
was  this  a  threat  only,  but  it  actually  happened,  we 
are  told,  in  the  case  of  $akalya  (Brih.  Ar.  Up. 

III,  9,  26).     Must  we  withhold  our  belief  from  such 
statements,   because  we  have  learnt  to  doubt  the 
burnt  hand  of  Mucius  Scaevola  and  the  suicide  of 
Lucretia  ?     I  believe  not,  for  the  cases  are  not  quite 
parallel. 

Besides  these  public  disputations,  we  also  read  of 
private  conferences  in  which  Ya^/lavalkya  enlightens 
his  royal  patron  6ranaka,  and  after  receiving  every 
kind  of  present  from  him  is  told  at  last  that  the 
king  gives  him  the  whole  of  his  kingdom,  nay 
surrenders  himself  to  him  as  his  slave.  We  may 
call  all  this  exaggerated,  but  we  have  no  right  to 
call  it  mere  invention,  for  such  stories  would  hardly 
have  been  invented,  if  they  had  sounded  as  in- 
credible in  India  itself  as  they  sound  to  us.  (Brih. 

IV,  4;   23.) 

It  is  true  we  meet  in  the  Upanishads  with  philo- 
sophical dialogues  between  gods  and  men  also,  such 
as  Kaush.  Up.  Ill,  i,  between  Indra  and  Pratar- 
dana,  between  Sanatkumara,  the  typical  warrior 
deity,  and  Narada,  the  representative  of  the  Brah- 
mans,  between  Pra.f/apati,  Indra,  and  Viro&ana, 
between  Yama,  the  god  of  death,  and  Na&iketas. 
But  though  these  are  naturally  mere  inventions, 
such  as  we  find  everywhere  in  ancient  times,  it  does 
not  follow  that  the  great  gatherings  of  Indian  sages 
presided  over  by  their  kings  should  be  equally 

1  I  translate  vipat  by  'to  fall  off/  not  by  'to  burst/  and 
the  causative  by  'to  make  fall  off/  i.e.  to  cut  off.  Would  not 
'to  burst'  have  been  vipaf? 

C 


l8  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

imaginary.      Even    imagination   requires    a  certain 
foundation  in  fact. 

We  have  a  record  of  another  disputation  between 
a  King  Af/atasatru  and  the  Brahman  Balaki,  and 
here  again  it  is  the  king  who  has  to  teach  the 
Brahman,  not  vice  versa. 


Ar/atasatru  was  king  of  Kasi  (Benares),  and  must 
have  been  later  than  kanaka,  as  he  appeals  to  his 
fame  as  widely  established.  When  he  has  con- 
vinced Balaki  of  the  insufficiency  of  the  information 
which  this  learned  Brahman  had  volunteered  to 
impart  to  him,  the  proud  Brahman  actually  declares 
himself  the  pupil  of  the  king  2. 

I  do  not  mean,  however,  to  deny  that  originally  the 
relation  between  the  kings  and  the  sages  of  ancient 
India  was  that  which  we  see  represented,  for  in- 
stance, in  the  case  of  King  6r4nasruti  and  the 
Brahman  Raikva,  who  contemptuously  rejects  all 
offers  of  friendship  from  the  king,  till  at  last  the 
king  has  to  offer  him  not  only  gold  and  land  (the 
Raikvapama  villages  in  the  country  of  the  Mahav?^'- 
shas)  but  his  own  daughter,  in  order  to  secure  his 
amity  and  his  instruction.  But  though  this  may 
have  been  the  original  relation  between  Brahmans 
and  Kshatriyas,  and  remained  so  to  the  time  re- 
presented by  Manu's  Law-book,  the  warrior  class 
had  evidently  from  a  very  early  time  produced  a 
number  of  independent  thinkers  who  were  able  to 


1  Kaushitaki  Up.  IV,  2  ;  Brfli.  Ar.  Up.  II,  i. 

2  See  also  the  dialogue  between   Sanatkumara  and   Narada 
(/tfmnd.  Up.  VII,  2,  i). 


BUDDHIST    PERIOD.  19 

grapple  with  and  to  hold  their  own  against  the 
priests,  nay,  who  were  superior  to  them  particularly 
in  one  subject,  as  we  are  told,  namely,  in  their 
knowledge  of  the  Atman,  the  Self.  In  the  Maitra- 
yawa-upanishad  we  read  of  King  Br^hadratha  who 
gives  up  his  kingdom,  retires  into  the  forest,  and 
is  instructed  by  the  sage  >Sakayanya,  whose  name 
may  contain  the  first  allusion  to  $akas  and  their 
descendants  in  India.  Such  a  royal  pupil  would 
naturally  in  the  course  of  his  studies  become  a  sage 
and  teacher  himself. 

Again,  in  the  TTAand.  Up.  V,  1 1  we  see  a  number 
of  eminent  Brahmans  approaching  King  Asvapati 
Kaikeya.  and  making  themselves  his  pupils.  The 
question  which  they  discuss  is,  What  is  our  Self 
and  what  is  Brahman  (V,  1 1 ,  i )  ?  and  this  question 
the  king  was  supposed  to  be  able  to  answer  better 
than  any  of  the  Brahmans. 

Buddhist  Period. 

When  we  leave  the  period  represented  by  the 
Upanishads,  and  turn  our  eyes  to  that  which  follows 
and  which  is  marked  by  the  rise  and  growth  of 
Buddhism,  we  find  no  very  sudden  change  in  the 
intellectual  life  of  the  country,  as  represented  to  us 
in  the  Sacred  writings  of  the  Buddhists.  Though 
there  is  every  reason  to  suppose  that  their  sacred 
code,  the  original  text  of  the  Tripifaka,  belongs 
to  the  third  century  B.C.,  and  was  settled  and  re- 
cited, though  not  written  down,  during  the  reign  of 
Asoka,  we  know  at  all  events  that  it  was  reduced 
to  writing  in  the  first  century  before  our  era,  and 
we  may  therefore  safely  accept  its  descriptions  as 
giving  us  a  true  picture  of  what  took  place  in  India 

c  2 


20  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

while  Buddhism  was  slowly  but  surely  supplanting 
the  religion  of  the  Veda,  even  in  its  latest  offshoots, 
the  Upanishads.  It  seems  to  me  a  fact  of  the 
highest  importance  that  the  Buddhists  at  the  time 
when  their  Suttas  were  composed,  were  acquainted 
with  the  Upanishads  and  the  Sutras,  at  all  events 
with  the  very  peculiar  names  of  these  literary  com- 
positions. We  must  not,  however,  suppose  that  as 
soon  as  Buddhism  arose  Vedism  disappeared  from 
the  soil  of  India.  India  is  a  large  country,  and 
Vedism  may  have  continued  to  flourish  in  the  West 
while  Buddhism  was  gaining  its  wonderful  triumphs 
in  the  East  and  the  South.  We  have  no  reason  to 
doubt  that  some  of  the  later  Upanishads  were  com- 
posed long  after  King  A.soka  had  extended  his 
patronage  to  the  Buddhist  fraternity.  Nay,  if  we 
consider  that  Buddha  died  about  477  B.C.,  we  are 
probably  not  far  wrong  if  we  look  upon  the  doctrines 
to  which  he  gave  form  and  life,  as  represented 
originally  by  one  of  the  many  schools  of  thought 
which  were  springing  up  in  India  during  the  period 
of  the  Upanishads,  and  which  became  later  on  the 
feeders  of  what  are  called  in  India  the  six  great 
systems  of  philosophy.  Buddha,  however,  if  we 
may  retain  that  name  for  the  young  prince  of 
Kapilavastu,  who  actually  gave  up  his  palace  and 
made  himself  a  beggar,  was  not  satisfied  with 
teaching  a  philosophy,  his  ambition  was  to  found 
a  new  society.  His  object  was  to  induce  people 
to  withdraw  from  the  world  and  to  live  a  life  of 
abstinence  and  meditation  in  hermitages  or  mon- 
asteries. The  description  of  the  daily  life  of  these 
Buddhist  monks,  and  even  of  the  Buddhist  laity, 
including  kings  and  nobles,  may  seem  to  us  at  first 


BRAHMA-GALA-SUTTA.  21 

sight  as  incredible  as  what  we  saw   before  in  the 
Upanishads. 

Prasena#it  and  Bimbisara. 

We  read  in  the  Tripkaka,  the  sacred  code  of 
the  Buddhists,  of  King  Prasenagdt,  of  Kosala, 
drawing  near  to  Buddha  and  sitting  down  respect- 
fully 'at  one  side  before  venturing  to  ask  him  a 
question  (Samyutta  Nikaya  III,  i,  4).  We  read 
likewise  of  King  Bimbisara,  of  Magadha,  showing 
the  same  respect  and  veneration  to  this  poor  monk 
before  asking  him  any  questions  or  making  any 
suggestions  to  him.  Bante  or  Lord  is  the  title  by 
which  the  paramount  sovereigns  of  India  address 
these  mendicants,  the  followers  of  Buddha. 

Brahma-<7ala-sutta. 

If  we  want  to  get  an  idea  of  the  immense  wealth 
and  variety  of  philosophic  thought  by  which  Buddha 
found  himself  surrounded  on  every  side,  we  cannot 
do  better  than  consult  one  of  the  many  Suttas  or 
sermons,  supposed  to  have  been  preached  by  Buddha 
himself,  and  now  forming  part  of  the  Buddhist 
canon,  such  as,  for  instance,  the  Brahma-^ala-sutta l. 

We  are  too  apt  to  imagine  that  both  the  believers 
in  the  Veda  and  the  followers  of  Buddha  formed 
compact  bodies,  each  being  held  together  by  gener- 
ally recognised  articles  of  faith.  But  this  can 
hardly  have  been  so,  as  we  read  in  the  Brahma- 
(/ala-sutta  that  even  among  the  disciples  who 

1  We  possess  now  an  excellent  translation  of  this  Sutta  by 
Ehys  Davids.  The  earlier  translations  by  Gogerly,  by  Grim- 
blot  (Sept  Suttas  Palis,  1876),  were  very  creditable  for  the 
time  when  they  were  made,  but  have  now  been  superseded. 


22  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

followed  Buddha,  some,  such  as  Brahmadatta,  spoke 
in  support  of  Buddha,  in  support  of  his  doctrines 
and  his  disciples,  while  others,  such  as  Suppiya, 
spoke  openly  against  all  the  three.  Though  there 
was  a  clear  line  of  demarcation  between  Brahmans 
and  Samanas  or  Buddhists,  as  far  as  their  daily 
life  and  outward  ceremonial  were  concerned,  the 
two  are  constantly  addressed  together  by  Buddha, 
particularly  when  philosophical  questions  are  dis- 
cussed. Brahmawa  is  often  used  by  him  as  a  mere 
expression  of  high  social  rank,  and  he  who  is  most 
eminent  in  knowledge  and  virtue  is  even  by  Buddha 
himself  called  '  a  true  Brahma?*a.'  Brahman  with  us 
is  often  used  in  two  senses  which  should  be  kept  dis- 
tinct, meaning  either  a  member  of  the  first  caste,  orone 
belonging  to  the  three  castes  of  the  twice-born  Aryas, 
who  are  under  the  spiritual  sway  of  the  Brahmans. 

We  must  try  to  get  rid  of  the  idea  that  Brahmans 
and  Buddhists  were  always  at  daggers  drawn,  and 
divided  the  whole  of  India  between  themselves. 
Their  relation  was  not  originally  very  different  from 
that  between  different  systems  of  philosophy,  such 
as  the  Vedanta  and  Samkhya,  which,  though  they 
differed,  were  but  seldom  inflamed  against  each 
other  by  religious  hatred. 

In  the  Brahma-iyala-sutta,  i.  e.  the  net  of  Brahma, 
in  which  all  philosophical  theories  are  supposed  to 
have  been  caught  like  so  many  fishes,  we  can  dis- 
cover the  faint  traces  of  some  of  the  schools  of 
philosophy  which  we  shall  have  to  examine  here- 
after. Buddha  mentions  no  less  than  sixty-two 
of  them,  with  many  subdivisions,  and  claims  to  be 
acquainted  with  every  one  of  them,  though  standing 
himself  above  them  all. 


BRAHMA-GALA-SUTTA.  23 

There  are  some  Samanas  and  Brahmans,  we  are 
told1,  who  are  eternalists,  and  who  proclaim  that 
both  the  soul  and  the  world  are  eternal2.  They 
profess  to  be  able  to  remember  an  endless  succession 
of  former  births,  including  their  names,  their  lineage, 
and  their  former  dwelling-places.  The  soul,  they 
declare,  is  eternal,  and  the  world,  giving  birth  to 
nothing  new,  is  steadfast  as  a  mountain  peak.  Living 
creatures  transmigrate,  but  they  are  for  ever  and 
ever. 

There  are  some  Samanas  and  Brahmans  who  are 
eternalists  with  regard  to  some  things,  but  not  with 
regard  to  others.  They  hold  that  the  soul  and  the 
world  are  partly  eternal,  and  partly  not.  According 
to  them  this  world-system  will  pass  away,  and  there 
will  then  be  beings  reborn  in  the  World  of  Light 
(Abhassara),  made  of  mind  only,  feeding  on  joy, 
radiating  light,  traversing  the  air  and  continuing  in 
glory  for  a  long  time.  Here  follows  a  most  peculiar 
account  of  how  people  began  to  believe  in  one 
personal  Supreme  Being,  or  in  the  ordinary  God. 
When  the  world-system  began  to  re-evolve,  there 
appeared  (they  say)  the  palace  of  Brahma,  but  it  was 
empty.  Then  a  certain  being  fell  from  the  World 
of  Light  and  came  to  life  in  the  palace  of  Brahma. 
After  remaining  there  in  perfect  joy  for  a  long- 
period,  he  became  dissatisfied  and  longed  for  other 
beings.  And  just  then  other  beings  fell  from  the 
World  of  Light,  in  all  respects  like  him.  But  he 
who  had  come  first  began  to  think  that  he  was 
Brahma,  the  Supreme,  the  Ruler,  the  Lord  of  all, 


1  Brahma-#ala-sutta,  translated  by  Khys  Davids,  p.  26  seq. 

2  This  would  be  like  the  £asvata-vada. 


24  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  Maker  and  Creator,  the  Ancient  of  days,  the 
Father  of  all  that  are  and  are  to  be.  The  other 
beings  he  looked  upon  as  created  by  himself,  because 
as  soon  as  he  had  wished  for  them,  they  had  come. 
Nay,  these  beings  themselves  also  thought  that  he 
must  be  the  Supreme  Brahma,  because  he  was  there 
first  and  they  came  after  him,  and  it  was  thought 
that  this  Brahmcl  must  be  eternal  and  remain  for 
ever,  while  those  who  came  after  him  were  imper- 
manent, mutable,  and  limited  in  duration  of  life. 

This  Brahma  reminds  one  of  the  Isvara  of  the 
Samkhya  and  other  philosophies,  which  as  Brahma, 
masc.,  must  be  distinguished  from  Brahma,  neuter. 
Then  we  are  told  that  there  are  some  gods  who 
spend  their  lives  in  sexual  pleasures  and  then  fall 
from  their  divine  state,  while  others  who  abstain 
from  such  indulgences  remain  steadfast,  immutable, 
and  eternal.  Again,  that  there  are  certain  gods  so 
full  of  envy  that  their  bodies  become  feeble  and  their 
mind  imbecile.  These  fall  from  their  divine  state, 
while  others  who  are  free  from  such  failings  remain 
steadfast,  immutable,  and  eternal. 

Lastly,  some  Sam  anas  and  Brahmans  are  led  to 
the  conclusion  that  eye,  ear,  nose,  tongue,  and  body 
form  an  impermanent  Self,  while  heart  or  mind  or 
consciousness  form  a  permanent  Self,  and  therefore 
will  remain  for  ever  steadfast,  immutable,  and  eternal. 

Next  follows  another  class  of  speculators  who 
are  called  Antanantikas,  and  who  set  forth  the 
infinity  and  finiteness  of  the  world.  They  maintain 
either  that  the  world  is  finite  or  that  it  is  infinite, 
or  that  it  is  infinite  in  height  and  depth,  but  finite 
in  lateral  extension,  or  lastly,  that  it  is  neither  finite 
nor  infinite. 


BRAHMA-GALA-SUTTA.  25 

The  next  description  of  the  various  theories  held 
by  either  Samanas  or  Brahmanas  seems  to  refer  to 
what  is  known  as  the  Sy4dvtada,  the  theory  that 
everything  may  be  or  may  not  be.  Those  who  hold 
to  this  are  called  wriggling  eels.  They  will  not  admit 
any  difference  between  good  and  bad,  and  they  will 
not  commit  themselves  to  saying  that  there  is 
another  world  or  that  there  is  not,  that  there  is 
chance  in  the  world  or  that  there  is  not,  that  any- 
thing has  a  result  or  reward  or  that  it  has  not,  that 
man  continues  after  death  or  that  he  does  not. 

It  would  seem,  according  to  some  of  the  Suttas, 
that  Buddha  himself  was  often  disinclined  to  commit 
himself  on  some  of  the  great  questions  of  philosophy 
and  religion.  He  was  often  in  fact  an  agnostic 
on  points  which  he  considered  beyond  the  grasp 
of  the  human  mind,  and  Mahavira,  the  founder  of 
(rainism,  took  the  same  view,  often  taking  refuge 
in  Agnosticism  or  the  Ae/mlnavada  1. 

Next,  there  are  Samanas  and  Brahmans  who  hold 
that  everything,  the  soul  and  the  world,  are  acci- 
dental and  without  a  cause,  because  they  can 
remember  that  formerly  they  were  not  and  now 
they  are,  or  because  they  prove  by  means  of  logic 
that  the  soul  and  the  whole  world  arose  without 
a  cause. 

Furthermore,  there  are  Samanas  and  Brahmans 
who  hold  and  defend  the  doctrine  of  a  conscious 
existence  after  death,  but  they  differ  on  several 
points  regarding  this  conscious  existence. 

Some  maintain  that  the  conscious  soul  after  death 
has  form,  others  that  it  has  no  form,  others  again 

]  M.  M.,  Natural  Keligion,  p.  105. 


26  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

that  it  has  and  has  not,  and  others  that  it  neither 
has  nor  has  not  form.  Some  say  it  is  finite,  others 
that  it  is  infinite,  that  it  is  both  and  that  it  is 
neither.  Some  say  that  it  has  one  mode  of  con- 
sciousness, others  that  it  has  various  modes  of 
consciousness,  others  that  it  has  limited,  others  that 
it  has  unlimited  consciousness.  Lastly,  it  is  held 
that  the  soul  after  death  is  happy,  is  miserable,  is 
both  or  is  neither. 

There  are,  however,  others  who  say  that  the  soul 
after  death  is  unconscious,  and  while  in  that  state 
has  either  form,  or  no  form,  has  and  has  not,  or  neither 
has  nor  has  not  form ;  that  it  is  finite,  infinite,  both 
or  neither. 

Again,  there  are  some  Samanas  and  Brahmans 
who  teach  the  entire  annihilation  of  all  living  beings. 
Their  arguments  are  various,  and  have  in  their 
general  outlines  been  traced  back  to  some  of  the 
teachers  of  Buddha,  such  as  Alara  Kalama,  Udda- 
laka  and  others l.  They  uphold  the  doctrine  of 
happiness  in  this  life,  and  maintain  that  complete 
salvation  is  possible  here  on  earth.  Thus  when  the 
soul  is  in  perfect  enjoyment  of  the  five  pleasures  of 
the  senses,  they  call  that  the  highest  Nirvana. 
Against  this  view,  however,  it  is  said  that  sensuous 
delights  are  transitory  and  always  involve  pain, 
and  that  therefore  the  highest  Nirvana  consists  in 
putting  away  all  sensuous  delights  and  entering 
into  the  first  (VMna,  i.  e.  Dhyana,  that  is,  a  state  of 
joy  born  of  seclusion  and  followed  by  reflection  and 
meditation.  Against  this  view,  again,  it  is  asserted 
that  such  happiness  involves  reasoning,  and  is  there- 


Khys  Davids,  1.  c.,  p.  48. 


BKAHMA-GALA-SUTTA.  27 

fore  gross,  while  the  highest  Nirvana  can  only  arise 
when  all  reasoning  has  been  conquered  and  the  soul 
has  entered  the  second  6rAana,  a  state  of  joy,  born  of 
serenity  without  reasoning,  a  state  of  elevation  and 
internal  calm.  But  even  this  does  not  satisfy  the 
true  Buddhist,  because  any  sense  of  joy  must  be  gross, 
and  true  Nirvana  can  only  consist  in  total  absence 
of  all  longing  after  joy  and  thus  entering  into  the 
third  6rMna,  serene  and  thoughtful.  Lastly,  even 
this  is  outbidden.  The  very  dwelling  of  the  mind 
on  care  and  joy  is  declared  to  be  gross,  and  the  final 
Nirvana  is  said  to  be  reached  in  the  fourth  6rMna  only, 
a  state  of  self-possession  and  complete  equanimity. 

This  abstract  may  give  an  idea  of  the  variety  of 
philosophical  opinions  which  were  held  in  India  at 
or  even  before  the  time  of  Buddha.  The  Brahma- 
(/ala-sutta  professes  that  all  speculations  about  the 
past  and  the  future  are  included  in  this  Sutta  of  the 
net  of  Brahma.  By  division  and  subdivision  there 
are  said  to  be  sixty-two  theories,  arranged  into  two 
classes  so  far  as  they  are  concerned  either  with  the 
past  or  with  the  future  of  the  soul ;  the  soul,  as  it 
seems,  being  always  taken  for  granted. 

The  extraordinary  part  is  that  in  the  end  all  these 
theories,  though  well  known  by  Buddha,  are  con- 
demned by  him  as  arising  from  the  deceptive  per- 
ceptions of  the  senses,  which  produce  desire,  attach- 
ment, and  therefore,  reproduction,  existence,  birth, 
disease,  death,  sorrow,  weeping,  pain,  grief,  and 
misery,  while  Buddha  alone  is  able  to  cut  off  the 
root  of  all  error  and  all  misery,  and  to  impart  the 
truth  that  leads  to  true  Nirvana. 

It  does  not  seem,  indeed,  as  if  the  philosophical 
teaching  of  Buddha  himself  was  so  very  different  at 


28  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

first  from  that  of  other  schools  which  had  flourished 
before  and  during  his  lifetime  in  India  ;  nay,  we  can 
often  perceive  clear  traces  of  a  distant  relationship 
between  Buddhism  and  the  six  orthodox  systems  of 
philosophy.  Like  streams,  all  springing  from  the 
same  summit,  they  run  on  irrigating  the  same 
expanse  of  country  without  proving  in  the  least 
that  one  channel  of  thought  was  derived  from 
another,  as  has  been  so  often  supposed  in  the  case 
particularly  of  Buddhism  in  its  relation  to  the 
Sa??ikhya  philosophy,  as  known  to  us  from  the 
Karikas  and  Sutras. 

Though  the  Brahma-^ala-sutta  does  not  enter 
into  full  details,  which  may  be  gathered  from  other 
Suttas,  it  shows  at  all  events  how  large  a  number 
of  philosophical  schools  was  in  existence  then,  and 
how  they  differed  from  each  other  on  some  very 
essential  points. 

Mahabharata. 

If  now  we  compare  one  of  the  numerous  passages 
in  the  Mahabharata,  containing  descriptions  of  the 
philosophical  sects  then  flourishing  in  India,  we 
shall  be  struck  by  the  great,  almost  verbal,  similarity 
between  their  statements  and  those  which  we  have 
just  read  in  the  Buddhist  Brahma-r/ala-sutta.  Thus 
we  read  in  the  Anugita,  chap.  XXIV  :  '  We  observe 
the  various  forms  of  piety  to  be  as  it  were  contra- 
dictory. Some  say  piety  remains  after  the  body 
is  destroyed  ;  some  say  that  it  is  not  so.  Some 
say  everything  is  doubtful  ;  and  others  that  there 
is  no  doubt.  Some  say  the  permanent  principle  is 
impermanent,  and  others,  too,  that  it  exists,  and 
others  that  it  exists  and  does  not  exist.  Some 


MAHABHARATA.  29 

say  it  is  of  one  form  or  twofold,  and  others  that 
it  is  mixed.  Some  Brahmawas,  too,  who  know 
Brahman  and  perceive  the  truth,  believe  that  it  is 
one  ;  others  that  it  is  distinct ;  and  others  again  that 
it  is  manifold.  Some  say  both  time  and  space  exist, 
and  others  that  it  is  not  so.  Some  have  matted 
hair  and  skins ;  and  some  are  clean-shaven  and 
without  any  covering.'  This  last  can  only  refer  to 
the  followers  of  Buddha,  whatever  the  date  of  our 
Mahabharata  may  be.  '  Some  people  are  for  bathing ; 
some  for  the  omission  of  bathing.  Some  are  for  taking 
food ;  others  are  intent  on  fasting.  Some  people 
extol  actions,  and  others  tranquillity.  Some  extol 
final  emancipation  and  various  kinds  of  enjoyments  ; 
some  wish  for  riches,  and  others  for  indigence.' 

The  commentator  Nilakan^Aa  refers  all  these 
remarks  to  certain  sects  known  to  us  from  other 
sources.  '  Some  hold,'  he  says,  '  that  the  Self  exists 
after  the  body  is  lost ;  others,  that  is,  the  Lokayatas 
or  .TTarvakas,  hold  the  contrary.  Everything  is 
doubtful,  is  the  view  of  the  Satyavadins  (Syadva- 
dins  r(] ;  nothing  is  doubtful,  that  of  the  Tairthikas, 
the  great  teachers.  Everything  is  impermanent, 
thus  say  the  Tarkikas  ;  it  is  permanent,  say  the 
Mimamsakas  ;  nothing  exists,  say  the  /Simyavadins  ; 
something  exists,  but  only  momentarily,  say  the 
Saugatas  or  Buddhists.  Knowledge  is  one,  but 
the  ego  and  non-ego  are  two  different  principles, 
thus  say  the  YogaMras  ;  they  are  mixed,  say  the 
Uc/ulomas ;  they  are  one,  such  is  the  view  of  the 
worshippers  of  the  Brahman  as  possessed  of  quali- 
ties ;  they  are  distinct,  say  other  Mimamsakas,  who 
hold  that  special  acts  are  the  cause  (of  everything) ; 
manifold  they  are,  say  the  atomists  ;  time  and  space 


30  IXDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

they  are,  say  the  astrologers.  Those  who  say  that  it 
is  not  so,  that  is  to  say,  that  what  we  see  has  no 
real  existence  at  all,  are  the  ancient  philosophers  ; 
omission  to  bathe 1  is  the  rule  of  the  Naish^Aika 
BrahmaMrins  ;  bathing  that  of  the  householders.' 

Thus  both  from  Buddhistic  and  Bran manic  sources 
we  learn  the  same  fact,  the  existence  of  a  large 
number  of  religious  and  philosophical  sects  in  the 
ancient  days  of  India. 

Buddha. 

Out  of  the  midst  of  this  whirlpool  of  philosophical 
opinions  there  rises  the  form  of  Buddha,  calling  for 
a  hearing,  at  first,  not  as  the  herald  of  any  brand 
new  philosophy,  which  he  has  to  teach,  but  rather 
as  preaching  a  new  gospel  to  the  poor.  I  cannot 
help  thinking  that  it  was  Buddha's  marked  person- 
ality, far  more  than  his  doctrine,  that  gave  him  the 
great  influence  on  his  contemporaries  and  on  so 
many  generations  after  his  death. 

Whether  he  existed  or  not,  such  as  he  is  de- 
scribed to  us  in  the  Suttas,  there  must  have  been 
some  one,  not  a  mere  name,  but  a  real  power  in  the 
history  of  India,  a  man  who  made  a  new  epoch  in 
the  growth  of  Indian  philosophy,  and  still  more  of 
Indian  religion  and  ethics.  His  teaching  must  have 
acted  like  a  weir  across  a  swollen  river.  And  no 
wonder,  if  we  consider  that  Buddha  was  a  prince  or 
nobleman  who  gave  up  whatever  there  wras  of  out- 
ward splendour  pertaining  to  his  rank.  He  need  not 
have  been  a  powerful  prince,  as  some  have  imagined, 

1  Does  not  this  refer  to  the  solemn  bathing  which  is  the  first 
step  towards  the  stage  of  u  Gr/hastha  or  independent  house- 
holder ? 


BUDDHA.  31 

but  he  belonged  to  the  royal  class,  and  it  does  not 
appear  that  he  and  his  house  had  any  suzerain 
over  them.  Like  several  of  the  philosophers  in  the 
Upanishads,  he  was  a  Kshatriya,  and  the  very  fact 
of  his  making  himself  a  popular  teacher  and  religious 
reformer  attracted  attention  as  a  social  anomaly  in 
the  eyes  of  the  people.  We  see  in  fact  that  one  of 
the  principal  accusations  brought  against  him,  at  a 
later  time,  was  that  he  had  arrogated  to  himself  the 
privilege  of  being  a  teacher,  a  privilege  that  had 
always  been  recognised  as  belonging  to  those  only 
who  were  Brahmans  by  birth.  And  as  these  Brah- 
mans  had  always  been  not  only  the  teachers  of  the 
people,  but  likewise  the  counsellors  of  princes,  we 
find  Buddha  also  not  only  patronised,  but  consulted 
by  the  kings  of  his  own  time.  Curiously  enough 
one  of  these  kings  has  the  name  of  A(/atasatru,  a 
name  well  known  to  us  from  the  Upanishads.  He, 
the  son  of  Vaidehi,  a  Videha  princess,  sends  two  of 
his  ministers,  who  were  Brahmans  by  birth,  to 
Buddha  in  order  to  consult  him  on  what  he  ought 
to  do.  It  has  been  supposed  by  some  scholars  that 
this  is  the  same  Agdtasatru,  king  of  Kasi  (or 
Benares),  who,  as  we  saw  in  the  Upanishads,  silenced 
the  Brahman  Balaki  (Kaush.  Up.  IV,  2,  i).  But, 
according  to  others,  A(/ata,s'atru,  i.  e.  '  without  an 
enemy,'  should  be  taken,  like  Devanam  priya,  as 
a  general  title  of  royalty,  not  as  a  proper  name  ' . 
However  that  may  be,  the  coincidence  is  cer- 
tainly striking,  and  requires  further  explanation. 
At  all  events,  we  see  that,  as  in  the  Upanishads, 
so  in  the  Tripkaka  also,  kings  appear  as  friends  and 

1  S.  B.  E.,  XI,  p.  i,  note. 


32  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

patrons  of  a  philosopher,  such  as  Buddha,  long  before 
he  had  become  recognised  as  the  founder  of  a  new 
religion,  that  they  take  a  prominent  part  in  public 
assemblies,  convened  for  discussing  the  great  problems 
of  religion  and  philosophy,  or  afterwards  for  settling 
the  canon  of  their  religious  texts.  The  best  known 
are  Bimbisara,  king  of  Magadha,  and  Prasena^it, 
king  of  Kosala. 

There  is  in  this  respect  a  clear  continuity  be- 
tween the  Upanishads  and  the  earliest  appearance 
of  Buddhism  ;  and  if  some  of  the  tenets  and  technical 
terms  of  the  Buddhists  also  are  the  same  as  those  of 
the  Hindu  schools  of  philosophy,  there  would  be  as 
little  difficulty  in  accounting  for  this  as  for  the  con- 
tinuity between  Sanskrit  and  Pali.  The  Buddhist 
monk  was  clearly  prefigured  in  the  Parivra//aka  or 
itinerant  mendicant  of  the  Upanishads  (B?~ih.  Ill, 
5).  The  name  of  Buddha,  as  the  awakened  and 
enlightened,  could  hardly  be  understood  without  the 
previous  employments  of  the  root  Budh  in  the  Veda  ; 
nor  Bhikshu,  beggar,  without  Bhiksh,  to  beg,  in  the 
Upanishads.  Nirvana,  it  is  true,  occurs  in  later 
Upanishads  only,  but  if  this  shows  that  they  are 
post-Buddhistic,  it  suggests  at  the  same  time  that 
the  old  Upanishads  must  have  been  pre-Buddhistic. 
Para  gati,  the  highest  goal,  is  taken  from  the  dic- 
tionary of  the  Upanishads,  and  possibly  7\akrapra- 
vartana,  the  turning  of  the  wheel l,  also  is  taken 
from  the  same  source. 

But  though  Buddhism  and  the  Upanishads  share 

1  Cf.  Anugita,  chap.  XVII :  'You  arc  the  one  person  to  turn 
this  wheel,  the  nave  of  which  is  the  Brahman,  the  spoke  the 
understanding,  and  which  does  not  turn  hack,  and  which  is 
checked  by  the  quality  of  goodness  as  its  circumference.' 


BUDDHA.  33 

many  things  in  common  which  point  back  to  the 
same  distant  antiquity,  Buddhism  in  its  practical 
working  produced  a  complete  social  revolution  in 
India.  Though  it  did  not  abolish  caste,  as  has 
sometimes  been  supposed,  it  led  to  a  mixture  of 
classes  which  had  formerly  been  kept  more  carefully 
distinct.  Anybody,  without  reference  to  his  birth, 
could  jt>in  the  Buddhist  fraternity,  if  only  he  was 
of  good  report  and  free  from  certain  civil  disabilities. 
He  could  then  become  an  itinerant  (Parivra^aka) 
friar,  without  any  of  that  previous  discipline  which 
was  required  from  a  Brahman.  Once  a  member  of 
the  Samgha,  he  was  free  from  all  family  ties  and 
allowed  to  support  himself  by  charitable  gifts 
(Bhiksha).  Though  kings  and  noblemen  who  had 
embraced  the  doctrines  of  Buddha  were  not  obliged 
to  become  actual  mendicants  and  join  the  fraternity, 
they  could  become  patrons  and  lay  sympathisers 
(Upasakas),  as  we  see  in  the  case  of  the  kings  already 
mentioned,  and  of  wealthy  persons  such  as  Anatha- 
pmcftka.  Whenever  the  Buddhist  friars  appeared 
in  villages  or  towns,  they  seem  to  have  been  re- 
ceived with  splendid  hospitality,  and  the  arrival  of 
Buddha  himself  with  his  six  hundred  or  more  dis- 
ciples was  generally  made  the  occasion  of  great 
rejoicings,  including  a  public  sermon,  a  public  dis- 
cussion, and  other  entertainments  of  a  less  spiritual 
character. 

In  fact,  if  we  may  judge  from  the  Tripifcika,  the 
whole  of  India  at  the  time  of  Buddha  would  seem 
once  more  to  have  been  absorbed  in  religion  and 
philosophy ;  nay,  the  old  saying  that  the  Indians 
are  a  nation  of  philosophers  would  seem  to  have 
never  been  so  true  as  at  the  time  of  the  great 

D 


34  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Buddhist  Councils,  held,  we  are  told,  at 

at   Vaisali,   and  later  on  at   the   new  residence  of 

Asoka,  Pateliputra. 

This  Asoka,  like  kanaka  of  old,  took  the  warmest 
interest  in  the  proceedings  of  that  Council.  It  is 
perhaps  too  much  to  say  that  he  made  Buddhism 
the  state-religion  of  India.  There  never  was  such 
a  thing  as  a  state-religion  in  India.  Asoka  cer- 
tainly extended  his  patronage,  formerly  confined  to 
Brahman s  only,  to  the  new  brotherhood  founded 
by  Buddha,  but  there  was  nothing  in  India  corre- 
sponding to  a  Defender  of  the  Faith. 

It  might  be  objected,  no  doubt,  that  the  authori- 
ties on  which  we  have  to  rely  for  a  description  of 
the  intellectual  state  of  India  at  the  time  of  these 
Councils,  even  that  of  Asoka,  242  B.C.,  are  one- 
sided and  exaggerated ;  but  when  we  consult  the 
Mahabharata  which,  in  its  earlier  elements,  at  all 
events,  may  be  assigned  to  the  same  Buddhistic 
period,  we  get  just  the  same  picture.  We  meet 
among  the  Brahmans  as  among  the  Buddhists  with 
an  immense  variety  of  philosophical  and  religious 
thought,  represented  by  schools  and  sects  striving 
against  each  other,  not  yet  by  persecution,  but  by 
serious  argumentation. 

Greek  Accounts. 

Nor  are  the  scant  accounts  which  the  Greeks 
have  left  us  of  what  they  saw  during  and  after 
the  invasion  of  India  by  Alexander  the  Great  at 
variance  with  what  we  learn  from  these  native 
authorities.  Nothing  struck  the  Greeks  so  much 
as  the  philosophical  spirit  which  seemed  to  pervade 


GREEK    ACCOUNTS.  35 

that  mysterious  country.     When  Megasthenes 1,  the 
ambassador  of  Seleucus    Nicator   at    the    court    of 
./Tandragupta    (Sandrocottus),    describes    what    he 
saw  in  India  in  the  third  century  B.C.,  he  speaks 
of  gymnosophists    living    on    mountains   or   in   the 
plains,   having  their  abode   in  groves    in   front    of 
cities    within     moderate- sized    enclosures.       '  They 
live,'  he  writes,  'in  a  simple  style,  and  lie  on  beds 
of  rushes  or  skins.     They  abstain  from  animal  food 
and    sexual    pleasures,    and    spend    their   time    in 
listening    to    serious    discourse    and    in    imparting 
their  knowledge  to  such  as   will  listen  to    them.' 
The  so-called  $armanas  mentioned  by  Megasthenes, 
have  generally  been  accepted  as   representing  the 
/Sramanas  or  Samanas,  the  members  of  the  Buddhist 
brotherhood  who   then  seemed  to  have  lived  most 
amicably  with  the  Brahmans.     Nothing  at  least  is 
said  of  any  personal  enmity  between  them,  however 
much  they  may  have  differed  in  their  philosophical 
and   religious    opinions.       His    Hylobioi   or   forest- 
dwellers    are    probably    meant    for   the    Brah manic 
Vanaprasthas,  the  members  of  the  third  Asrama  who 
had  to  live  in  the  forest,  at  a  certain  distance  from 
their  villages,  and  give  themselves  up  to  asceticism 
and  meditation,  such  as  we  see  described  in  the  Upani- 
shads.     Even  if  their  name  did  not  tell  us,  we  are 
distinctly  informed  that  they  lived  in  the  forest,  sub- 
sisting on  leaves  and  wild  fruits,  and  wore  garments 
made  of  the  bark  of  trees  (Valkala)  -.     They  com- 
municated, we  are  told,  with  kings,  who,  like  6ranaka 
and  A(/atas'atru,  Prasena^/it  and  Bimbisara,  or  in  later 

1  Ancient  India,  by  J.  W.  McCrindle,  1877,  p.  97  seq. 

2  Clement  Alex.,  Strom,  i.  p.  305,  adds  that  they  neither  live 
in  cities  nor  even  in  houses. 

D  2 


36  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

times  King  Harsha,  consulted  them  by  messengers 
regarding  the  causes  of  things,  and  who  through  them 
worshipped  and  supplicated  their  gods.  Clement  of 
Alexandria,  after  repeating  all  this,  adds  at  the  end 
that  there  are  also  philosophers  in  India  who  follow 
the  precepts  of  Butta,  whom  they  honour  as  a  god 
on  account  of  his  extraordinary  holiness.  This  is 
the  first  Greek  mention  of  Buddha,  for  no  one  else 
can  have  been  meant  by  Clement.  The  name  was 
never  mentioned  by  Alexander's  companions,  though 
there  are  early  coins,  which  point  to  Greek  influence, 
with  the  figure  and  name  of  Boddo.  We  are  also 
told  that  these  philosophers  practised  fortitude,  both 
by  undergoing  active  toil,  and  by  enduring  pain, 
remaining  for  whole  days  motionless  in  a  fixed 
attitude. 

Buddhist  Pilgrims,  Hiouen-thsang. 

Some  centuries  later  we  have  another  and  inde- 
pendent source  of  information  on  the  intellectual 
state  of  India,  and  this  also  is  in  perfect  accordance 
with  what  we  have  hitherto  learnt  about  India 
as  the  home  of  philosophers.  Beginning  with  the 
fourth  century  of  our  era,  that  is,  at  the  time  when 
what  I  call  the  Renaissance  of  Sanskrit  literature 
and  national  independence  began,  Chinese  Buddhists 
who  made  their  pilgrimages  to  India,  as  to  their 
Holy  Land,  described  to  us  the  state  of  the  country 
such  as  they  saw  it.  Those  who  came  early,  such 
as  Fa-hian,  saw  Buddhism  flourishing  in  the  fifth 
century,  those  who  came  later  in  the  sixth  and 
seventh  centuries, witnessed  alreadv  the  evident  simis 

»/  c? 

of  its  decline.  The  most  important  among  them 
was  Hiouen-thsang  who  visited  India  from  629  to 


CHINESE    ACCOUNTS.  37 

645,  and  whose  travels  have  been  translated  by  my 
late  friend,  Stanislas  Julien.  No  one  can  doubt  the 
trustworthiness  of  this  witness,  though  he  may  have 
been  deceived  in  some  of  his  observations.  He  de- 
scribes the  Buddhist  monasteries  scattered  all  over 
the  country,  the  schools  of  the  most  illustrious 
teachers  whose  lectures  he  attended,  and  their 
public  assemblies,  particularly  those  that  took  place 
at  the  court  of  /S'iladitya  Harshavardhana  610-650, 
commonly  called  $ri-Harsha  of  Kanyakub^a.  This 
king,  who  is  described  as  having  conquered  the  five 
Indias,  seems  to  have  been  in  his  heart  a  Buddhist, 
though  he  bestowed  his  patronage  and  protection 
on  all  sects  alike,  whether  followers  of  the  Vedas  or 
of  Buddha.  No  one,  we  are  told,  was  allowed  to 
eat  flesh  in  his  dominions,  and  whoever  had  killed 
a  living  thing  was  himself  put  to  death  '.  He  built 
many  hospitals  and  monasteries,  and  entertained  many 
Buddhist  friars  at  his  own  expense.  Every  year  he 
assembled  the  >Srama^as  from  different  kingdoms, 
and  made  them  discuss  in  his  presence  the  most  im- 
portant points  of  Buddha's  doctrine.  Each  disputant 
had  his  chair,  and  the  king  himself  was  present  to 
judge  of  their  learning  and  their  good  behaviour. 
Hiouen-thsang,  who  by  this  time  had  made  himself 
a  proficient  Sanskrit  scholar  and  Buddhist  theolo- 
gian, having  studied  the  Buddhist  writings  under 
some  of  the  most  illustrious  teachers  of  the  time, 
was  invited  by  the  king  to  be  present  at  one  of 
these  great  assemblies,  on  the  southern  bank  of  the 
Ganges.  Twenty  kings  were  gathered  there,  each 
bringing  with  him  both  $ramanas  and  Brahmanas. 

1  Memoires  sur  les  Contrees  Occidentales,  Julien,  i.  p.  251  seq. 


38  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

A  large  camp  was  constructed,  and  every  day  rich 
alms  were  bestowed  on  the  $ramanas.  This,  as  it 
would  seem,  excited  the  anger  of  some  Brahmans 
who  were  present.  They  tried  to  set  fire  to  the 
camp  and  the  magnificent  buildings  erected  by  the 
king.  And  when  they  failed  in  this,  they  actually 
hired  an  assassin  to  kill  the  monarch.  The  king, 
however,  escaped,  and  forgave  the  would-be  assassin, 
but  exiled  a  large  number  of  Brahmans  from  his 
kingdom.  This  gives  us  the  first  idea  of  what 
at  that  time  religious  persecution  meant  on  the 
part  of  Buddhists  as  well  as  of  Brahmans.  These 
persecutions  may  have  been  exaggerated,  but  they 
cannot  be  altogether  denied.  Hiouen-thsang  him- 
self seems  to  have  taken  an  active  part  in  this 
Congress  of  Religion,  and  I  still  believe  it  was  he 
who  is  mentioned  by  his  Sanskrit  name  as  '  Moksha- 
deva '  or  as  the  '  Master  of  the  Tripiteka.'  After 
making  all  reasonable  deductions,  such  as  we  should 
make  in  the  case  of  the  descriptions  of  any  enthu- 
siastic witness,  enough  seems  to  me  to  remain  to 
show  that  from  the  time  of  the  Upanishads  to  the 
time  of  Hiouen-thsang's  sojourn  in  India,  one  domi- 
nant interest  pervaded  the  whole  country,  the  interest 
in  the  great  problems  of  humanity  here  on  earth. 
While  in  other  countries  the  people  at  large  cared 
more  for  their  national  heroes,  as  celebrated  in  their 
epic  poetry  on  account  of  their  acts  of  bravery  or 
cunning,  India  under  the  sway  of  its  Vedic  poets, 
most  of  them  of  a  priestly  rather  than  a  warrior 
origin,  remained  true  to  its  character.  Its  kings 
surrounded  themselves  witli  a  court  of  sages 
rather  than  of  warriors,  and  the  people  at  large 
developed  and  strengthened  their  old  taste  for 


KING    HARSHA.  39 

religious  and  philosophical  problems  that  has  en- 
dured for  centuries,  and  is  not  extinct  even  at  the 
present  day.  Of  course,  if  we  call  the  people  of 
India  a  nation  of  philosophers,  this  is  not  meant 
to  deny  that  the  warrior  class  also  had  their 
popular  heroes,  and  that  their  achievements  also 
excited  the  interest  of  the  people.  India  is  large 
enough  for  many  phases  of  thought.  We  must  not 
forget  that  even  in  the  Vedic  hymns  Indra,  the 
most  popular  of  their  gods,  was  a  warrior.  The 
two  great  epic  poems  are  there  to  testify  that  hero- 
worship  is  innate  in  the  human  heart,  and  that  in 
early  days  men  and  even  women  will  place  muscle 
higher  than  brain.  But  many  even  of  these  epic 
heroes  have  a  tinge  of  philosophical  sadness  about 
them,  and  Argoma,  the  greatest  among  them,  is  at 
the  same  time  the  recipient  of  the  highest  wisdom 
communicated  to  him  by  KHshna,  as  described  in  the 
Bhagavad-gita. 

KHstma  himself,  the  hero  of  the  Bhagavad-gita, 
was  of  Kshatriya  origin,  and  was  looked  upon  as 
the  very  incarnation  of  the  Deity.  It  is  curious 
that  the  Sanskrit  language  has  no  wrord  for  epic 
poetry.  Itihasa  refers  to  the  matter  rather  than  to 
the  poetical  form  of  what  we  should  call  epic  poems, 
and  the  Hindus,  strange  to  say,  speak  of  their 
Mahabharata  as  a  Law-book,  Dharmasastra  l,  and  to 
a  certain  extent  it  may  have  fulfilled  that  purpose. 

King  Harsha. 

If  the  account  given  by  Hiouen-thsang  of  the 
spiritual  state  of  India  at  the  time  of  his  visit 

1  See  Dahlmann,  Das  Mahabharata. 


40  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  of  his  stay  at  the  court  of  Harsha  should  seem 
to  be  tinged  too  much  by  the  sentiments  of  the 
Buddhist  priest,  we  have  only  to  consult  the 
history  of  Harsha  as  written  in  Sanskrit  by  Ba/ia, 
to  feel  convinced  of  the  faithfulness  of  his  account. 
No  doubt  Hiouen-thsang  looked  at  India  with  the 
eyes  of  a  follower  of  Buddha,  but  Bai^a  also,  though 
not  a  Buddhist,  represents  to  us  the  different  schools 
and  teachers,  whether  followers  of  Buddha  or  of 
the  Veda,  as  living  together  apparently  in  perfect 
peace,  and  obeying  the  orders  of  the  same  king. 
They  would  naturally  discuss  their  differences  and 
exchange  opinions  on  points  on  which  they  were 
agreed  or  opposed  to  each  other,  but  of  violent 
persecutions  by  one  side  or  the  other,  or  of  excom- 
munications and  massacres,  we  hear  very  little  or 
nothing.  The  king  himself,  the  friend  and  patron 
of  Hiouen-thsang,  tolerated  both  Buddhism  and 
Brahmanism  in  his  realm,  and  we  feel  doubtful 
sometimes  which  of  the  two  he  favoured  most  in 
his  own  mind.  We  see  him,  for  instance,  pay  his 
respects  to  a  sage  of  the  name  of  Divakara,  who 
had  been  by  birth  and  education  a  Brahman,  but 
had  been  converted  to  Buddha's  doctrine,  without, 
as  it  would  seem,  incurring  thereby  the  displeasure 
of  the  king  or  of  his  friends.  In  the  Harsha-/rarita' 
the  king  is  represented  to  us  as  entering  a  large 
forest,  surrounded  by  his  retinue.  When  approach- 
ing the  abode  of  the  sage,  the  king  leaves  his 
suite  behind  arid  proceeds  on  foot,  attended  by  only 
a  few  of  his  vassals.  While  still  at  a  distance  from 
the  holy  man's  abode,  the  king  perceived  a  large 


Harsha-frarita,  translated  by  Cowull  and  Thomas,  p.  235. 


KING    HARSH  A.  4! 

number  of  'Buddhists  from  various  provinces,  perched 
on  pillows,  seated  on  rocks,  dwelling  in  bowers  of 
creepers,  lying  in  thickets  or  in  the  shadow  of 
branches,  or  squatting  on  the  roots  of  trees, — de- 
votees dead  to  all  passions,  6rainas  in  white  robes 
($vetambaras),with  mendicants  (Bhikshus  orParivra- 
#akas),  followers  of  Krishna  (Bhagavatas),  religious 
students  (Brahma/iarins),  ascetics  who  pulled  out 
their  hair,  followers  of  Kapila  (Samkhyas),  6rainas, 
Lokayatikas  (atheists),  followers  of  Kamda  (Vaise- 
shikas),  followers  of  the  Upanishads  (Vedantins), 
believers  in  God  as  a  creator  (Naiyayikas),  assayers 
of  metals  (?),  students  of  legal  institutes,  students 
of  the  Purcbias,  adepts  in  sacrifices  requiring  seven 
priests,  adepts  in  grammar,  followers  of  the  Pa/l/ta- 
ratras,  and  others  beside,  all  diligently  following 
their  own  tenets,  pondering,  urging  objections, 
raising  doubts,  resolving  them,  giving  etymologies, 
and  disputing,  discussing  and  explaining  moot  points 
of  doctrine,'  and  all  this,  it  would  seem,  in  perfect 
peace  and  harmony. 

Now  I  ask  once  more,  is  there  any  other  country 
in  the  world  of  which  a  similar  account  could  be  given, 
always  the  same  from  century  to  century  ?  Such 
a  life  as  here  described  may  seem  very  strange  to 
us,  nay,  even  incredible,  but  that  is  our  fault,  because 
we  forget  the  totally  different  conditions  of  in- 
tellectual life  in  India  and  elsewhere.  We  cannot 
dissociate  intellectual  life  from  cities,  from  palaces, 
schools,  universities,  museums,  and  all  the  rest. 
However,  the  real  life  of  India  was  not  lived  in 
towns,  but  in  villages  and  forests.  Even  at  present 
it  should  be  remembered  that  towns  are  the  ex- 
ception in  India,  and  that  the  vast  majority  of 


42  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

people  live  in  the  country,  in  villages,  and  their 
adjoining  groves.  Here  the  old  sages  were  free  to 
meditate  on  the  problems  of  life  and  on  all  that 
is  nearest  to  the  heart  of  man.  If  they  were  not 

;  philosophers,    let    them    be    called    dreamers,    but 
dreamers  of  dreams  without  which  life  would  hardly 

/  be  worth  living. 

An  insight  into  this  state  of  things  seemed 
to  me  necessary  as  a  preliminary  to  a  study  of 
Indian  philosophy  as  being  throughout  the  work 
of  the  people  rather  than  that  of  a  few  gifted  in- 
dividuals. As  far  back  as  we  can  trace  the  history 
of  thought  in  India,  from  the  time  of  King  Harsha 
and  the  Buddhist  pilgrims  back  to  the  descriptions 
found  in  the  Mahabharata,  the  testimonies  of  the 
Greek  invaders,  the  minute  accounts  of  the  Bud- 
dhists in  their  Tripi^aka,  and  in  the  end  the 
Upanishads  themselves,  and  the  hymns  of  the  Veda, 
\ve  are  met  everywhere  by  the  same  picture,  a 
society  in  which  spiritual  interests  predominate  and 
throw  all  material  interests  into  the  shade,  a  world 
of  thinkers,  a  nation  of  philosophers. 


CHAPTER  II. 

The  Vedas. 

IF  after  these  preliminary  remarks  we  look  for 
the  real  beginnings  of  philosophy  on  the  soil  of 
India,  we  shall  find  them  in  a  stratum  where 
philosophy  is  hardly  differentiated  as  yet  from 
religion,  and  long  before  the  fatal  divorce  between 
religion  and  philosophy  had  been  finally  accomplished, 
that  is  in  the  Vedas. 

There  have  been  curious  misunderstandings  about 
this  newly-discovered  relic  of  ancient  literature,  if 
literature  it  may  be  called,  having  nothing  what- 
ever to  do  in  its  origin  with  any  litera  scripta.  No 
one  has  ever  doubted  that  in  the  Veda  we  have  the 
earliest  monument  of  Aryan  language  and  thought, 
and,  in  a  certain  sense,  of  Aryan  literature  which, 
in  an  almost  miraculous  way,  has  been  preserved  to 
us,  during  the  long  night  of  centuries,  chiefly  by 
means  of  oral  tradition.  But  seeing  that  the  Veda 
was  certainly  more  ancient  than  anything  we  pos- 
sess of  Aryan  literature  elsewhere,  people  jumped 
at  the  conclusion  that  it  would  bring  us  near  to  the 
very  beginning  of  all  things,  and  that  we  should 
find  in  the  hymns  of  the  Rig-veda  the  '  very  songs 
of  the  morning  stars  and  the  shouts  of  the  sons  of 
God.'  When  these  expectations  were  disappointed, 
many  of  these  ancient  hymns,  turning  out  to  be 


44  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

very  simple,  nay  sometimes  very  commonplace,  and 
with  little  of  positive  beauty,  or  novel  truth,  a  re- 
action set  in,  as  it  always  does  after  an  excessive 
enthusiasm.  The  Vedic  hymns  were  looked  on  ask- 
ance, and  it  was  even  hinted  that  they  might  be  but 
forgeries  of  those  very  suspicious  individuals,  the 
Brahmans  or  Pandits  of  India.  In  the  end,  however, 
the  historical  school  has  prevailed,  and  the  historian 
now  sees  that  in  the  Vedas  we  have  to  deal,  not  with 
what  European  philosophers  thought  ought  to  have 
been,  but  with  what  is  and  has  been  ;  not  with  what 
I  is  beautiful,  but  with  what  is  true  and  historically 
real.  If  the  Vedic  hymns  are  simple,  natural,  and 
often  commonplace,  they  teach  us  that  very  useful 
lesson  that  the  earliest  religious  aspirations  of  the 
Aryan  conquerors  of  India  were  simple  and  natural, 
and  often,  from  our  point  of  view,  very  commonplace. 
This 'too  is  a  lesson  worth  learning.  Whatever  the 
Vedas  may  be  called,  they  are  to  us  unique  and 
priceless  guides  in  opening  before  our  eyes  tombs 
of  thought  richer  in  relics  than  the  royal  tombs  of 
Egypt,  and  more  ancient  and  primitive  in  thought 
than  the  oldest  hymns  of  Babylonian  or  Accadian 
poets.  If  we  grant  that  they  belonged  to  the  second 
millennium  before  our  era,  we  are  probably  on  safe 
ground,  though  we  should  not  forget  that  this  is  a 
constructive  date  only,  and  that  such  a  date  does 
not  become  positive  by  mere  repetition.  It  may  be 
very  brave  to  postulate  2000  B.C.  or  even  5000  B.C. 
as  a  minimum  date  for  the  Vedic  hymns,  but  what 
is  gained  by  such  bravery  ?  Such  assertions  are 
safe  so  far  as  they  cannot  be  refuted,  but  neither 
can  they  be  proved,  considering  that  we  have  no 
contemporaneous  dates  to  attach  them  to.  And 


THE    VEDAS.  45 

when  I  say  that  the  Vedic  hymns  are  more  ancient 
and  primitive  than  the  oldest  Babylonian  and  Acca- 
dian  hymns,  all  that  I  mean  and  could  mean  is  that 
they  contain  fewer  traces  of  an  advanced  civilisa- 
tion than  the  hymns  deciphered  from  cuneiform 
tablets,  in  which  we  find  mention  of  such  things  as 
temples  in  stone  and  idols  of  gold,  of  altars,  sceptres 
and  crowns,  cities  and  libraries,  and  public  squares. 
There  are  thoughts  in  those  ancient  Mesopotamian 
hymns  which  would  have  staggered  the  poets  of 
the  Veda,  such  as  their  chief  god  being  called  the 
king  of  blessedness,  the  light  of  mankind,  &c.  We 
should  look  in  vain  in  the  Veda  for  such  advanced 
ideas  as  '  the  holy  writing  of  the  mouth  of  the 
deep/  '  the  god  of  the  pure  incantation,'  '  thy  will 
is  made  known  in  heaven  and  the  angels  bow  their 
faces,'  '  I  fill  my  hand  with  a  mountain  of  diamonds, 
of  turquoises  and  of  crystal,'  '  thou  art  as  strong 
bronze,'  '  of  bronze  and  lead  thou  art  the  mingler,' 
or  '  the  wide  heaven  is  the  habitation  of  thy  liver.' 
All  this  may  be  very  old  as  far  as  the  progression 
of  the  equinoxes  is  concerned,  but  in  the  progress 
of  human  thought  these  ideas  mark  a  point,  not 
yet  reached  by  the  poets  of  the  Veda.  In  that 
sense,  whatever  their  age,  these  Babylonian  hymns 
are  more  modern  in  thought  than  the  very  latest 
hymns  of  the  Rig-veda,  though  I  confess  that  it 
is  that  very  fact,  the  advanced  civilisation  at  that 
early  time  which  they  reflect,  that  makes  the  Baby- 
lonian hymns  so  interesting  in  the  eyes  of  the 
historian.  I  do  not  speak  here  of  philosophical 
ideas,  for  we  have  learnt  by  this  time  that  they  are 
of  no  age  and  of  any  age. 

Whatever  may  be  the  date  of  the  Vedic  hymns, 


46  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

whether  1500  or  15000  B.C.,  they  have  their  own 
unique  place  and  stand  by  themselves  in  the  litera- 
ture of  the  world.  They  tell  us  something  of  the 
early  growth  of  the  human  mind  of  which  we  find 
no  trace  anywhere  else.  Whatever  aesthetic  judge- 
ments may  be  pronounced  on  them,  and  there  is 
certainly  little  of  poetical  beauty  in  them,  in  the 
eyes  of  the  historian  and  the  psychologist  they  will 
always  retain  their  peculiar  value,  far  superior  to 
the  oldest  chronicles,  far  superior  to  the  most  an- 
cient inscriptions,  for  every  verse,  nay  every  word 
in  them,  is  an  authentic  document  in  the  history 
of  the  greatest  empire,  the  empire  of  the  human 
mind,  as  established  in  India  in  the  second  mil- 
lennium B.C. 

The  Philosophical  Basis  of  the  Vedic  Gods. 

Let  us  begin  with  the  simplest  beginnings.  What 
can  be  simpler  than  the  simple  conviction  that  the 
regularly  recurring  events  of  nature  require  certain 
agents  ?  Animated  by  this  conviction  the  Vedic 
poets  spoke  not  only  of  rain  (Indu),  but  of  a  rainer 
(Indra),  not  only  of  fire  and  light  as  a  fact,  but  of 
a  lighter  and  burner,  an  agent  of  fire  and  light,  a 
Dyaus  (Zevs)  and  an  Agni  (ignis).  It  seemed  im- 
possible to  them  that  sun  and  moon  should  rise 
every  day,  should  grow  strong  and  weak  again 
every  month  or  every  year,  unless  there  was  an 
agent  behind  who  controlled  them.  We  may  smile 
at  such  thoughts,  but  they  were  natural  thoughts, 
nor  would  it  be  easy  even  now  to  prove  a  negative 
to  this  view  of  the  world.  One  of  these  agents 
they  called  Savitar  ('^L^TT/P,  or  vtnos),  the  enlivener, 
as  distinguished  yet  inseparable  from  Surya,  the 


PHILOSOPHICAL    BASIS    OF    VEDIC    GODS.  47 

heavenly,  the  sun,  Greek  Helios.  Soma,  from  the 
same  root  Su,  was  likewise  at  first  what  enlivens, 
i.  e.  the  rain,  then  the  moon  which  was  supposed 
to  send  dew  and  rain,  and  lastly  the  enlivening 
draught,  used  for  sacrificial  purposes  and  prepared 
from  a  plant  called  Sorna  or  the  enlivener,  a  plant 
known  to  Brahmans  and  Zoroastrians  before  the 
separation  of  the  two.  In  this  way  both  the  re- 
ligion and  the  mythology  of  the  Vedic  sages  have 
a  philosophical  basis,  and  deserve  our  attention,  if 
we  wish  to  understand  the  beginnings  not  only  of 
Indian  mythology  and  religion,  but  of  Indian  philo- 
sophy also.  '  No  one,'  as  Deussen  truly  says,  '  can 
or  should  in  future  talk  about  these  things  who 
does  not  know  the  liig-veda1.'  The  process  on 
which  originally  all  gods  depended  for  their  very 
existence,  the  personification  of,  or  the  activity  attri- 
buted to  the  great  natural  phenomena,  while  more 
or  less  obscured  in  all  other  religions,  takes  place 
in  the  Big-veda  as  it  were  in  the  full  light  of  day. 
The  gods  of  the  Vedic,  and  indirectly  of  all  the 
Aryan  people,  were  the  agents  postulated  behind 
the  great  phenomena  of  nature.  This  was  the  be- 
ginning of  philosophy,  the  first  application  of  the 
law  of  causality,  and  in  it  we  have  to  recognise 
the  only  true  solution  of  Indo-European  mythology, 
and  likewise  of  Aryan  philosophy.  Whatever  may 
have  existed  before  these  gods,  we  can  only  guess  at, 
we  cannot  watch  it  with  our  own  eyes,  while  the 
creation  of  Dyaus,  light  and  sky,  of  Prithivi,  earth,  of 
Vanma,  dark  sky,  of  Agni,  fire,  and  other  such  Vedic 
deities,  requires  neither  hypothesis  nor  induction. 

1  Deussen,  Allgemeine  Geschichte  der  Philosophic,  p.  83. 


40  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

There  was  the  sky,  Dyaus,  apparently  active,  hence 
there  must  be  an  agent,  called  Dyaus.  To  say  that 
this  Aryan  Theogony  was  preceded  by  a  period  of 
fetishism  or  totemism,  is  simply  gratuitous.  At  all 
events,  it  need  not  be  refuted  before  it  has  been 
proved.  Possibly  the  naming  of  the  sky  as  an 
agent  and  as  a  masculine  noun  came  first,  that  of 
the  mere  objective  sky,  as  a  feminine,  second. 

Three  Classes  of  Vedic  Gods. 

We  know  now  by  what  very  simple  process  the 
Vedic  Aryas  satisfied  their  earliest  craving  for 
causes,  how  they  created  their  gods,  and  divided 
the  whole  drama  of  nature  into  three  acts  and  the 
actors  into  three  classes,  those  of  the  sky,  those  of 
mid-air,  and  those  of  the  earth.  To  the  first  belong 
Dyaus,  the  agent  of  the  sky  ;  Mitra,  the  agent  of 
the  bright  sky  and  day ;  Varu??a,  the  agent  of  the 
dark  sky  and  evening  ;  Surya,  the  agent  of  the  sun  ; 
Savitn',  the  agent  of  the  enlivening  or  morning  sun  ; 
Asvinau,  the  twin  agents  of  morning  and  evening  ; 
Ushas,  the  maiden  of  the  dawn. 

To  mid-air  belong  Indra,  the  agent  of  the  atmo- 
sphere in  its  change  between  light  and  darkness, 
the  giver  of  rain  ;  the  Marutas,  the  agents  of 
the  storm-clouds  ;  Vayu  and  Vata,  the  agents  of  the 
air ;  Parr/anya,  the  agent  of  the  rain-cloud  ;  Iludra, 
the  agent  of  storm  and  lightning,  and  several  others 
connected  with  meteoric  phenomena. 

To  the  earth  belong  Prithivi  herself,  the  earth 
as  active  ;  Agui,  the  agent  of  fire  ;  Saras  vat  i  and 
other  rivers;  sometimes  the  Dawn  also,  as  rising 
from  the  earth  as  well  as  from  the  sky.  These 
gods  were  the  first  philosophy,  the  first  attempt  at 


OTHER    CLASSIFICATIONS    OF    GODS.  49 

explaining  the  wonders  of  nature.  It  is  curious  to 
observe  the  absence  of  anything  like  star-worship  in 
India  among  the  Aryan  nations  in  general.  A  few 
of  the  stars  only,  such  as  were  connected  with  human 
affairs,  determining  certain  seasons,  and  marking 
the  time  of  rain  (Hyades),  the  return  of  calmer 
weather  (Pleiades),  or  the  time  for  mowing  (Krit- 
tikas),  were  noticed  and  named,  but  they  never 
rose  to  the  rank  of  the  high  gods.  They  were  less 
interesting  to  the  dwellers  in  India,  because  they 
did  not  exercise  the  same  influence  on  their  daily  life 
as  they  do  in  Europe.  There  was  of  course  no  settled 
system  in  this  pantheon,  the  same  phenomena  being 
often  represented  by  different  agents,  and  different 
phenomena  by  the  same  agents.  The  gods,  how- 
ever, had  evidently  been  known  before  they  were 
distributed  into  three  classes,  as  gods  of  the  sky, 
of  the  earth,  and  of  the  clouds  l. 

Other  Classifications  of  Gods. 

If  we  call  this  creation  and  likewise  classification 
of  the  Devas  or  gods,  the  first  philosophy  of  the 
human  race,  we  can  clearly  see  that  it  was  not 
artificial  or  the  work  of  one  individual  only,  but 
was  suggested  by  nature  herself.  Earth,  air,  and 
sky,  or  again,  morning,  noon,  and  night,  spring, 
summer,  and  winter,  are  triads  clearly  visible  in 
nature,  and  therefore,  under  different  names  and 
forms,  mirrored  in  ancient  mythology  in  every  part 
of  the  world.  These  triads  are  very  different  from 
the  later  number  assigned  to  the  gods.  Though 
the  Devas  are  known  in  the  Kig-veda  and  the 

1  M.  M.,  Contributions  to  the  Science  of  Mythology,  p.  475. 

E 


50  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Avesta  as  thirty-three,  I  doubt  whether  there  is 
any  physical  necessity  for  this  number '.  It  seems 
rather  due  to  a  taste  very  common  among  un- 
civilised tribes  of  playing  with  numbers  and  multi- 
plying them  to  any  extent 2.  We  see  the  difficulty 
experienced  by  the  Brahmans  themselves  when  they 
had  to  fill  the  number  of  thirty-three  and  give  their 
names.  Sometimes  they  are  called  three  times 
eleven  ;  but  when  we  ask  who  these  three  times 
eleven  are,  we  find  no  real  tradition,  but  only  more 
or  less  systematising  theories.  We  are  told  that 
they  were  the  gods  in  the  sky,  on  earth,  and  in  the 
clouds  (I,  139,  1 1),  or  again  that  they  wrere  Vasus, 
Rudras,  Adityas,  Visve  Devas,  and  Maruts  3,  but  the 
number  of  each  of  these  classes  of  gods  seems  to  have 
been  originally  seven  rather  than  eleven.  Even 
this  number  of  seven  is  taken  by  some  scholars  in 
the  general  sense  of  many,  like  devanam  bhuyish- 
thsih  ',  but  it  is  at  all  events  recognised  in  the  Hig- 
veda  VIII,  28,  5,  though  possibly  in  a  late  verse. 
What  we  look  for  in  vain  in  the  Veda  are  the  names 
of  seven  Maruts  or  seven  Hudras.  We  can  perhaps 
make  out  seven  Vasus,  if,  as  we  are  told,  they  are 
meant  for  Agni,  the  Adityas,  the  Marutas,  Indra, 
Ushas,  the  Asvins  and  Iludra.  The  seven  Adityas, 
too,  may  possibly  be  counted  as  Vanma,  Mitra, 
Aryaman,  Bhaga,  Daksha,  A??isa,  and  Tvash^rt,  but 
all  this  is  very  uncertain.  We  see  in  fact  the  three 
times  eleven  replaced  by  the  eight  Vasus,  the  eleven 
Maruts,  and  the  twelve  Adityas,  to  which  two  other 


1  Satap.  Br.  XII,  6,  i,  p.  205. 

2  Contributions,  p.  475. 

3  Vedanta-Sutras  I,  3,  28;  and  Kig-veda  X,  122,  i. 


THE    VISVE    OR    ALL-GODS.  51 

gods  are  added  as  leaders,  to  bring  their  number 
up  to  the  required  thirty-three. 

In  still  later  times  the  number  of  the  Adityas, 
having  been  taken  for  the  solar  light  in  each  suc- 
cessive month,  was  raised  to  twelve.  I  look  upon 
all  these  attempts  at  a  classification  of  the  Vedic 
gods  as  due  once  more  to  the  working  of  a  philo- 
sophical or  systematising  spirit.  It  is  not  so  much 
the  exact  number  or  names  of  these  gods,  as  the 
fact  that  attempts  had  been  made  at  so  early  a  time 
to  comprehend  certain  gods  under  the  same  name, 
that  interests  the  philosophical  observer. 

The  Visve  or  All-gods. 

The  first  step  in  this  direction  seems  to  be  repre- 
sented by  the  Visve  or  the  Visve  Devas.  Visva  is 
different  from  Sarva,  all.  It  means  the  gods  to- 
gether, Gesammtgotter  (cuncti),  not  simply  all  the 
gods  (omnes).  Sometimes,  therefore,  the  two  words 
can  be  used  together,  as  Taitt.  Br.  Ill,  i,  i,  Visva 
bhuvanani  sarva,  'all  beings  together.'  The  Maruts 
are  called  Visve  Mariita/^,  in  the  sense  of  all  the 
Maruts  together.  These  Visve,  though  they  belong 
to  the  class-gods  (Gawas),  are  different  from  other 
class-gods  inasmuch  as  their  number  is  hardly 
fixed.  It  would  be  endless  to  give  the  names  of 
all  the  gods  who  are  praised  in  the  hymns  addressed 
to  the  Visve  Devas.  Indra  often  stands  at  their 
head  (Indra^yesh^aA),  but  there  is  hardly  one  of 
the  Vedic  gods  who  does  not  at  times  appear  as  one 
of  them.  What  is  really  important  in  these  Visve  is 
that  they  represent  the  first  attempt  at  comprehend- 
ing the  various  gods  as  forming  a  class,  so  that  even 
the  other  classes  (Ganas),  such  as  Adityas,  Vasus, 

E  2 


52  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

or  Rudras  may  be  comprehended  under  the  wider 
concept  of  Visve.  It  is  all  the  more  curious  that 
this  important  class,  important  not  only  for  mytho- 
logical but  for  philosophical  and  religious  purposes 
also,  should  have  attracted  so  little  attention  hither- 
to. They  are  passed  over,  as  a  class,  even  in  that  rich 
treasure-house  of  Vedic  Mythology,  the  fifth  volume 
of  Muir's  Original  Sanskrit  Texts,  but  they  ought 
not  to  be  ignored  by  those  who  are  interested  in  the 
progress  of  the  ancient  mythological  religions  from 
given  multiplicity  to  postulated  unity,  as  an  essential 
character  of  the  godhead. 

Tendencies  towards  Unity  among  the  Gods. 

But  while  this  conception  of  Visve  Devas  marks 
the  first  important  approach  from  the  many  inco- 
herent gods  scattered  through  nature  to  a  gradually 
more  and  more  monotheistic  phase  of  thought  in  the 
Veda,  other  movements  also  tended  in  the  same 
direction.  Several  gods,  owing  to  their  position  in 
nature,  were  seen  to  perform  the  same  acts,  and 
hence  a  poet  might  well  take  upon  himself  to  say 
that  Agni  not  only  acted  with  Indra  or  Savitn',  but 
that  in  certain  of  his  duties  Agni  was  Indra  and  was 
Savit?^'.  Hence  arose  a  number  of  dual  gods,  such 
as  Indra-Agni,  Mitra-Varunau,  Agiii-Shomau,  also 
the  two  Asvins.  On  other  occasions  three  gods  were 
praised  as  working  together,  such  as  Aryaman,  Mitra 
and  Varu?za,  or  Agni,  Soma  and  Gandharva,  while 
from  another  point  of  view,  Vishnu  with  his  three 
strides  represented  originally  the  same  heavenly 
being,  as  rising  in  the  morning,  culminating  at  noon, 
and  setting  in  the  evening.  Another  god  or  goddess, 
Aditi,  was  identified  with  the  sky  and  the  air,  was 


HENOTHEISM,    MONOTHEISM    AND    MONISM.  53 

called  'mother,  father,  and  son,  was  called  all  the 
gods  and  the  five  races  of  men,  was  called  the  past 
and  the  future.  Professor  Weber  has  strangely 
misunderstood  me  if  he  imagines  that  I  designated 
this  phase  of  religious  thought  as  Henotheism. 

Henotheism. 

To  identify  Indra,  Agni,  and  Vanma  is  one  thing, 
it  is  syncretism  ;  to  address  either  Indra  or  Agni  or 
Vanma,  as  for  the  time  being  the  only  god  in 
existence  with  an  entire  forge tfulness  of  all  other 
gods,  is  quite  another ;  and  it  was  this  phase,  so 
fully  developed  in  the  hymns  of  the  Yeda,  which 
I  wished  to  mark  definitely  by  a  name  of  its  own, 
calling  it  Henotheism  l. 

Monotheism  and  Monism. 

All  these  tendencies  worked  together  in  one 
direction,  and  made  some  of  the  Vedic  poets  see 
more  or  less  distinctly  that  the  idea  of  god,  if  once 
clearly  conceived,  included  the  ideas  of  being  one 
and  without  an  equal.  They  thus  arrived  at  the 
conviction  that  above  the  great  multitude  of  gods 
there  must  be  one  supreme  personality,  and,  after 
a  time,  they  declared  that  there  was  behind  all  the 
gods  that  one  (Tad  Ekam)  of  which  the  gods  were 
but  various  names. 

Rv.  I,  164,  46.  Ekam  sat  vipra/i  bahudha  vadanti,  Agnim, 
Yamam,  Matarisvanam  ahuh. 

The  sages  call  that  One  in  many  ways,  they  call  it  Agni, 
Yama,  Matarisvan. 

1  This  phase  of  religious  thought  has  been  well  described  in 
the  same  fifth  volume  of  Muir's  Original  Sanskrit  Texts,  p.  352  ; 
see  ,also  Deussen,  Geschichte  der  Philosophie,  I,  p.  104. 


54  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Kv.  X,  129,  2.  Anit  avatam  svadhaya  tat  ekam,  tasmat  ha 
anyat  na  para/j  kirn  fcana  asa. 

That  One  breathed  breathlessly  by  itself,  other  than  it  there 
nothing  since  has  been. 

Tlie  former  thought  led  by  itself  to  a  monotheistic 
religion,  the  latter,  as  ive  shall  see,  to  a  monistic 
philosophy. 

In  trying  to  trace  the  onward  movement  of 
religious  and  philosophical  thought  in  the  Veda, 
we  should  recognise  once  for  all  the  great  difficulties 
with  which  we  have  to  contend.  Speaking  as  yet 
of  the  hymns  only,  we  have  in  the  Rig-veda  a 
collection  of  i  ,o  1 7  hymns,  each  on  an  average  con- 
taining about  ten  verses.  But  this  collection  was 
made  at  different  times  and  in  different  places, 
systematically  in  some  respects,  but  in  others,  more 
or  less  at  random.  We  have  no  right  to  suppose 
that  we  have  even  a  hundredth  part  of  the  religious 
and  popular  poetry  that  existed  during  the  Vedic 
age.  We  must  therefore  carefully  guard  against 
such  conclusions  as  that,  because  we  possess  in 
our  Rig-veda-samhita  but  one  hymn  addressed  to 
a  certain  deity,  therefore  that  god  was  considered 
as  less  important  or  was  less  widely  worshipped 
than  other  gods.  This  has  been  a  very  common 
mistake,  and  I  confess  that  there  is  some  excuse  for 
it,  just  as  there  was  for  looking  upon  Homer  as  the 
sole  representative  of  the  whole  epic  poetry  of  Greece, 
and  upon  his  mythology  as  the  mythology  of  the 
whole  of  Greece.  But  we  must  never  forget  that 
the  Ilig-veda  is  but  a  fragment,  and  represents  the 
whole  of  Vedic  mythology  and  religion  even  less 
than  Homer  represents  the  whole  of  Greek  mytho- 
logy and  religion.  It  is  wonderful  enough  that 


PRA£APATI.  55 

such  a  collection  should  have  escaped  destruction 
or  forgetfulness,  when  we  keep  in  mind  that  the 
ancient  literature  of  India  was  purely  mnemonic, 
writing  being  perfectly  unknown,  but  the  art  of 
mnemonics  being  studied  all  the  more  as  a  discipline 
essential  to  intellectual  life.  What  has  come  down 
to  us  of  Vedic  hymns,  by  an  almost  incredible,  yet 
well  attested  process,  is  to  us  a  fragment  only,  and 
we  must  be  on  our  guard  not  to  go  beyond  the 
limits  assigned  to  us  by  the  facts  of  the  case.  Nor 
can  the  hymns  which  have  come  down  to  us  have 
been  composed  by  one  man  or  by  members  of  one 
family  or  one  community  only ;  they  reach  us  in  the 
form  of  ten  collections  (Manc?alas)  composed,  we  are 
told,  by  different  men,  and  very  likely  at  different 
periods.  Though  there  is  great  similarity,  nay  even 
monotony  running  through  them,  there  are  differ- 
ences also  that  cannot  fail  to  strike  the  attentive 
reader.  In  all  such  matters,  however,  we  must  be 
careful  not  to  go  beyond  the  evidence  before  us, 
and  abstain  as  much  as  possible  from  attempting 
to  systematise  and  generalise  what  comes  to  us  in 
an  unsystematised,  nay  often  chaotic  form. 

Pra#apati. 

Distinguishing  therefore,  as  much  as  possible, 
between  what  has  been  called  tentative  monotheism, 
which  is  religion,  and  tentative  monism,  which  is 
philosophy,  we  can  discover  traces  of  the  former  in 
the  famous  hymn  X,  121,  which,  years  ago,  I  called 
the  hymn  to  the  Unknown  God.  Here  the  poet 
asks  in  every  verse  to  whom,  to  what  Deva,  he 
should  offer  his  sacrifice,  and  says  towards  the  end 
whether  it  should  be,  ya/i  deveshu  adhi  devaA  eka/i 


56  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

&sit,  '  he  who  alone  was  god  above  gods/  Many  of 
the  ordinary  gods  are  constantly  represented  as 
supreme,  with  an  entire  forgetfulness  that  one  only 
can  be  so  ;  but  this  is  very  different  from  the  distinct 
demand  here  made  by  the  poet  for  a  god  that  should 
be  above  all  other  gods.  It  is  much  more  like  the 
Semitic  demand  for  a  god  above  all  gods  (Exod.  xviii. 
n),  or  for  a  father  of  gods  and  men,  as  in  Greece 
(narrjp  av8pS>v  re  6t5>v  re).  Aristotle  already  remarked 
that,  as  men  have  one  king,  they  imagined  that  the 
gods  also  must  be  governed  by  one  king1.  I  believe, 
however,  that  the  ground  for  this  lies  deeper,  and 
that  the  idea  of  oneness  is  really  involved  in  the 
idea  of  God  as  a  supreme  and  unlimited  being. 
But  Aristotle  might  no  doubt  have  strengthened  his 
argument  by  appealing  to  India  where  ever  so  many 
clans  and  tribes  had  each  their  own  king,  whether 
Rar/ah  or  Maharajah,  and  where  it  might  seem  natural 
to  imagine  a  number  of  supreme  gods,  each  with 
their  own  limited  supremacy.  Still  all  this  would 
have  satisfied  the  monistic  craving  for  a  time  only. 
Here  too,  in  the  demand  for  and  in  the  supply  of 
a  supreme  deity,  we  can  watch  a  slow  and  natural 
progress.  At  first,  for  instance,  when  (Rv.  VIII,  89) 
Indra  was  to  be  praised  for  his  marvellous  deeds,  it 
was  he  \vho  had  made  the  sun  to  shine.  He  was  called 
iS'atakratu,  the  all-powerful  and  all-wise,  or  Abhibhu, 
the  conqueror.  At  the  end  the  poet  sums  up  by 
saying :  Visva-karma  visvd-deva/i  maha'n  asi,  '  thou 
art  the  maker  of  all  things,  thou  art  the  great 
Visvadeva  (all-god).'  The  last  word  is  difficult  to 
translate,  but  its  real  purport  becomes  clear,  if  we 

1  Arist.  Politics,  i,  2,  7  ;  Muir,  O.  S.  T.,  V,  p.  5. 


VISVAKARMAN.       TVASHTRI.  57 

remember  what  we  saw  before  with  reference  to  the 
origin  of  the  Visve  Devas. 

Visvakarman. 

In  such  adjectives  as  $atakratu,  and  still  more  in 
Visvakarman,  the  maker  of  all  things,  we  see  the 
clear  germs  that  were  to  grow  into  the  one  supreme 
deity.  As  soon  as  Visvakarman  was  used  as  a  sub- 
stantive, the  Brahmans  had  what  they  wanted,  they 
had  their  All-maker,  their  god  above  all  gods,  the 
god  whose  friendship  the  other  gods  were  eager  to 
secure  (VIII,  89,  3). 

Tvashtfn. 

The  maker  or  creator  of  all  things  is  the  nearest 
approach  to  the  one  and  only  god  of  later  times.  It 
should  not  be  forgotten,  however,  that  there  was 
already  another  maker,  called  Tvashfrn,  i.e.  re/crew,  only 
that  he  did  not  rise  to  the  position  of  a  real  creator 
of  all  things.  He  seems  to  have  been  too  old,  too 
mythological  a  character  for  philosophical  purposes. 
He  remained  the  workman,  the  Hephaestos,  of  the 
Vedic  gods,  well  known  as  the  father  of  Saranyu 
and  Visvarupa.  He  had  all  the  requisites  for  be- 
coming a  supreme  deity,  in  fact,  he  is  so  here  and 
there,  as  when  he  is  addressed  as  having  formed 
heaven  and  earth  (X,  1 10,  9),  nay,  as  having  begotten 
everything  (visvam  bhuvanam  </a(/ana).  He  is  in 
fact  all  that  a  Creator  can  be  required  to  be,  being 
supposed  to  have  created  even  some  of  the  gods, 
such  as  Agni,  Indra,  and  Brahmaviaspati  (Rv.  X,  2, 
7  ;  II,  23,  17).  If  Agni  himself  is  called  Tvash^H 
(Rv.  II,  i,  5),  this  is  merely  in  consequence  of  that 
syncretism  which  identified  Agni  with  ever  so  many 


58  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

gods,  but  more  particularly  with  Tvash^ri',  the  simper 
of  all  things. 

When  Tvash^ri  is  called  Savitrz,  this  does  not 
necessarily  imply  his  identity  with  the  god  SavitH, 
but  the  word  should  in  that  case  be  taken  as  a  pre- 
dicate, meaning  the  enlivener,  just  as  in  other  places 
he  is  praised  as  the  nourisher  or  preserver  of  all 
creatures,  as  the  sun  (Rv.  Ill,  55,  19).  One  of  the 
causes  why  he  did  not,  like  Prar/apati  or  Visvakarman, 
become  a  supreme  god  and  creator  was  his  having 
belonged  to  a  more  ancient  pre-Vedic  stratum  of 
gods.  This  might  also  account  for  Indra's  hostility  to 
Tvashf?^',  considering  that  he  (Indra),  as  a  new  god, 
had  himself  supplanted  the  older  gods,  such  as  Dyaus. 
We  must  be  prepared  for  many  such  possibilities, 
though  I  give  them  here  as  guesses  only.  It  is  possible 
also  that  the  name  of  Asura,  given  to  Tvash^ri  and 
to  his  son  Visvarupa,  points  in  the  same  direction, 
and  that  we  should  take  it,  not  in  the  sense  of  an 
evil  spirit,  but  in  the  sense  of  an  ancient  daimon  in 
which  it  is  applied  in  other  hymns  to  Varmza,  and 
other  ancient  Devas.  Tvash^ri  is  best  known  as  the 
father  of  Sara?iyu  and  the  grandfather  therefore  of 
the  Asvins  (day  and  night),  but  it  is  a  mistake  to 
suppose  that  as  father  of  Yama  and  Yami  he  was  ever 
conceived  as  the  progenitor  of  the  whole  human  race. 
Those  who  so  confidently  identify  Yama  and  Yami 
with  Adam  and  Eve  seem  to  have  entirely  forgotten 
that  Yama  never  had  any  children  of  Yami.  In 
his  mythological  character,  Tvash^r/  is  sometimes 
identical  with  Dyaus  (Zeus)1,  but  he  never  becomes, 
as  has  sometimes  been  supposed,  a  purely  abstract 

1  Contributions,  II,  p.  560. 


SEARCH  FOR  A  SUPREME  DEITY.         59 

deity  ;  and  in  this  we  see  the  real  difference  between 
Tvash^H  and  Visvakarman.  Visvakarman,  originally 
a  mere  predicate,  has  no  antecedents,  no  parents, 
and  no  offspring,  like  Tvashiri  (Rv.  X,  81,  4).  The 
work  of  Visvakarman  is  described  in  the  following 
words,  which  have  a  slight  mythological  colouring  : 
'  What  was  the  stand,  the  support,  what  and  how 
was  it,  from  whence  the  all-seeing  Visvakarman 
produced  by  his  might  the  earth  and  stretched  out 
the  sky  ?  The  one  god  who  on  every  side  has 
eyes,  mouths,  arms  and  feet,  blows  (forges)  with  his 
two  arms  and  with  wings,  while  producing  heaven 
and  earth  l.' 

How  vague  and  uncertain  the  personal  character 
of  Visvakarman  was  in  Vedic  times,  we  can  see 
from  the  fact  that  the  Taittiriya  Brtihmana  ascribes 
the  very  acts  here  ascribed  to  Visvakarman  to 
Brahman 2.  At  a  later  time,  Visvakarman,  the 
All-maker,  became  with  the  Buddhists,  as  Visva- 
kamma,  a  merely  subordinate  spirit,  who  is  sent  to 
act  as  hairdresser  to  Buddha.  The  gods  also  have 
their  fates  ! 

Search  for  a  Supreme  Deity. 

The  same  human  yearning  for  one  supreme  deity 
which  led  the  Vedic  priests  to  address  their  hymns 
to  the  Visve  Devas  or  to  Visvakarman  as  the  maker 
of  all  things,  induced  them  likewise  to  give  a  more 
personal  character  to  Pra^/apati.  This  name,  meaning 

1  This  blowing  has  reference  to   the  forge  on  which   the 
smith  does  his  work.     Wings  were  used  instead  of  bellows, 
and  we  must  take  care  not  to  ascribe  angels'  wings  to  Tvash/rt 
or  to  any  god  of  Vedic  times,  unless  he  is  conceived  as  a  bird, 
and  not  as  a  man. 

2  Taitt.  Br.  II,  8,  9,  6  ;  Muir,  O.S.T.,  V,  p.  355. 


60  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

lord  of  creatures,  is  used  in  the  Rig-veda  as  a  pre- 
dicate of  several  gods,  such  as  Soma,  Savitri,  and 
others.  His  later  origin  has  been  inferred  from  the 
fact  that  his  name  occurs  but  three  times  in  the 
Rig-veda  *.  These  arithmetical  statistics  should,  how- 
ever, be  used  with  great  caution.  First  of  all  my 
index  verborum  is  by  no  means  infallible,  and  secondly 
our  Samhita  of  the  Rig-veda  is  but  a  segment,  pro- 
bably a  very  small  segment,  of  the  mass  of  religious 
poetry  that  once  existed.  In  the  case  of  Pra^apati 
I  had  left  out  in  my  Index  one  passage,  X,  121,  i  o, 
and  though,  for  very  good  reasons,  I  considered  and 
still  consider  this  verse  as  a  later  addition,  this  was 
probably  no  excuse  for  omitting  it,  like  all  that  is 
omitted  in  the  Pada-text  of  the  Rig-veda.  The  whole 
hymn  must  have  been,  as  I  thought,  the  expression  of 
a  yearning  after  one  supreme  deity,  who  had  made 
heaven  and  earth,  the  sea  and  all  that  in  them  is. 
But  many  scholars  take  it  as  intended  from  the 
very  first  verse  for  the  individualised  god,  Pra</apati. 
I  doubt  this  still,  and  I  give  therefore  the  translation 
of  the  hymn  as  I  gave  it  in  1 860,  in  my  '  History  of 
Ancient  Sanskrit  Literature '  (p.  568).  It  has  been 
translated  many  times  since,  but  it  will  be  seen  that 
I  have  had  but  little  to  alter. 

Hymn  to  the  Unknown  God. 

1.  In  the  beginning  there  arose  the  germ  of  golden  light, 
Hirawyagarbha  ;  he  was  the  one  born  lord  of  all  that  is.     He 
stablished  the  earth  and  this  sky — Who  is  the  god  to  whom 
we  should  offer  our  sacrifice? 

2.  He  who  gives  life,  lie  who  gives  strength  ;  whose  com- 
mand all  the  bright  gods  revere  ;  whose  shadow  is  immortality 

1  Muir,  O.S.T.,  V,  390. 


HYMN    TO    THE    UNKNOWN    GOD.  6l 

and  mortality  (gods  and  men) — Who  is  the  god  to  whom  we 
should  offer  our  sacrifice  ? 

3.  He  who  through  his  power  became  the  sole  king  of  this 
breathing  and  slumbering  world — he  who  governs  all,  man 
and  beast — Who  is  the  god   to  whom  we   should   offer   our 
sacrifice  ? 

4.  He  through  whose  greatness  these  snowy  mountains  are, 
and  the  sea,  they  say,  with  the  Kasa,  the  distant  river,  he 
whose  two  arms  these  regions  are — Who  is  the  god  to  whom 
we  should  offer  our  sacrifice  ? 

5.  He  through  whom  the  sky  is  strong,  and  the  earth  firm, 
he  through  whom  the  heaven  was  established,  nay  the  highest 
heaven,  he  who  measured  the  light  in  the  air — Who  is  the  god 
to  whom  we  should  offer  our  sacrifice  ? 

6.  He  to  whom   heaven  and    earth   (or,    the   two   armies) 
standing  firm  by  his  help,  look  up,  trembling  in  their  minds, 
he  over  whom  the  rising  sun  shines  forth — Who  is  the  god  to 
whom  we  should  offer  our  sacrifice  ? 

7.  When  the  great  waters  went  everywhere,   holding  the 
germ  and  generating  fire,  thence  he  arose  who  is  the  sole  life 
of  the  bright  gods — Who  is  the  god  to  whom  we  should  offer 
our  sacrifice  ? 

8.  He  who  by  his  might  looked  even  over  the  waters,  which 
gave  strength  and  produced  the  sacrifice,  he  who  alone  is  god 
above  all  gods — Who  is  the  god  to  whom  we  should  offer  our 
sacrifice  ? 

9.  May  he  not  destroy  us,  he,  the  creator  of  the  earth,  or  he, 
the  righteous,  who  created  the  heaven,  he  who  also  created  the 
bright  and  mighty  waters — Who  is  the  god  to  whom  we  should 
offer  our  sacrifice  ? 

Then  follows  the  verse  which  I  treated  as  a  later 
addition,  because  it  seemed  to  me  that,  if  Pra^apati 
had  been  known  by  the  poet  as  the  god  who  did 
all  this,  he  would  not  have  asked,  at  the  end  of  every 
verse,  who  the  god  was  to  whom  sacrifice  should  be 
offered.  However,  poets  have  their  own  ways. 
But  the  strongest  argument  against  the  final  verse, 
which  my  critics  have  evidently  overlooked,  is  the 


62  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

fact  that  this  verse  has  not  been  divided  by  the 
Padakara.  I  still  hold,  therefore,  that  it  was  a  later 
addition,  that  it  is  lame  and  weak,  and  spoils  the 
character  of  the  hymn.  It  runs  as  follows  :— 

10.  '0  Pra^apati,  no  other  but  thou  has  held  together  all 
these  things  ;  whatever  we  desire  in  sacrificing  to  thee,  may 
that  be  ours,  may  we  be  the  lords  of  wealth.' 

With  this  conception  of  Pra</apati  as  the  lord  of 
all  created  things  and  as  the  supreme  deity,  the 
monotheistic  yearning  was  satisfied,  even  though 
the  existence  of  other  gods  was  not  denied.  And 
what  is  curious  is  that  we  see  the  same  attempt l 
repeated  again  and  again.  Like  Visvakarman  and 
Prar/apati  we  find  such  names  as  Purusha,  man  ; 
Hira?iyagarbha,  golden  germ ;  Pnma,  breath,  spirit ; 
Skambha,  support  (X,  81,7);  DhatH,  maker ;  VidhatH, 
arranger  ;  Namadha,  name-giver  of  the  gods,  ovo^a- 
ToOerrjs  and  others,  all  names  for  the  Eka  Deva,  the 
one  god,  though  not,  like  Pra^/apati,  developed  into 
fullgrown  divine  personalities.  These  names  have 
had  different  fates  in  later  times.  Some  meet  us 
again  during  the  Brahmana  period  and  in  the  Athar- 
vawa  hymns,  or  rise  to  the  surface  in  the  more 
modern  pantheon  of  India  ;  others  have  disappeared 
altogether  after  a  short  existence,  or  have  resumed 
their  purely  predicative  character.  But  the  deep 
groove  which  they  made  in  the  Indian  mind  has 
remained,  and  to  the  present  day  the  religious  wants 
of  the  great  mass  of  the  people  in  India  seem  satisfied 
through  the  idea  of  the  one  supreme  god,  exalted 
above  all  other  gods,  whatever  names  may  have 
been  given  to  him.  Even  the  gods  of  modern  times 

1  M.  M.,  Theosophy,  pp.  244  seq. 


BRAHMAN,  ATMAN,  TAD  EKAM.          63 

such  as  /Siva  and  Vistmu,  nay  goddesses  even,  such 
as  Kali,  Parvati,  Durga,  are  but  new  names  for  what 
was  originally  embodied  in  the  lord  of  created  things 
(Prae/apati)  and  the  maker  of  all  things  (Vi.s-va- 
karman).  In  spite  of  their  mythological  disguises, 
these  modern  gods  have  always  retained  in  the  eyes 
of  the  more  enlightened  of  their  worshippers  traces 
of  the  character  of  omnipotence  that  was  assigned 
even  in  Vedic  times  to  the  one  supreme  god,  the 
god  above  all  gods. 

Brahman,  Atman,  Tad  Ekam. 

We  have  now  to  take  another  step  in  advance. 
By  the  side  of  the  stream  of  thought  which  we 
have  hitherto  followed,  we  see  in  India  another 
powerful  movement  which  postulated  from  the  first 
more  than  a  god  above,  yet  among,  other  gods.  In 
the  eyes  of  more  thoughtful  men  every  one  of  the 
gods,  called  by  a  personal  and  proper  name,  was 
limited  ipso  facto,  and  therefore  not  fit  to  fill  the 
place  which  was  to  be  filled  by  an  unlimited  and 
absolute  power,  as  the  primary  cause  of  all  created 
things.  No  name  that  expressed  ideas  connected 
with  the  male  or  female  sex,  not  even  Pra^apati  or 
Visvakarman,  was  considered  as  fit  for  such  a  being, 
and  thus  we  see  that  as  early  as  the  Yedic  hymns 
it  was  spoken  of  as  Tad  Ekam,  that  One,  as  neither 
male  nor  female,  that  is,  as  neuter.  We  come  across 
it  in  the  hymn  of  Dirghatamas  (I,  164,  6  x),  where, 

1  This  hymn,  the  author  of  which  is  called  Dirghatamas.  i.e. 
Long  Darkness,  is  indeed  full  of  obscure  passages.  It  has 
been  explained  by  Haug  (Vedische  Rathselfragen  und  Riithsel- 
spriiche,  1875)  and  more  successfully  by  Deussen,  in  his  Allge- 
meine  Geschichte  der  Philosophie,  p.  108,  but  it  still  contains 
much  that  has  to  be  cleared  up. 


64  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

after  asking  who  he  was  that  established  these  six 
spaces  of  the  world,  the  poet  asks,  '  Was  it  perhaps 
the  One  (neuter),  in  the  shape  of  the  Unborn 
(masc.)?'  This  should  be  read  in  connection  with 
the  famous  forty-sixth  verse  : — 

'  They  call  (it)  Indra,  Mitra  and  Varuwa,  Agni  : 
then  (comes)  the  heavenly  bird  Garutman ;  that 
which  is  the  One,  the  poets  call  in  many  ways,  they 
call  it  Agni,  Yama,  Matarisvan.' 

Here  we  see  the  clear  distinction  between  the 
One  that  is  named  and  the  names,  that  is,  the 
various  gods,  and  again  between  the  One  without 
form  or  the  unborn,  that  is,  the  unmanifested,  and 
those  who  established  the  whole  world.  This  One, 
or  the  Unborn,  is  mentioned  also  in  X,  82,  6, 
where  we  read  '  The  One  is  placed  in  the  nave 
of  the  unborn  where  all  beings  rested/  Again  in 
a  hymn  to  the  Visve  Devas,  III,  54,  8,  the  poet, 
when  speaking  of  heaven  and  earth,  says  :— 

'  They  keep  apart  all  created  things,  and  tremble 
not,  though  bearing  the  great  gods ;  the  One  rules 
over  all  that  is  unmoving  and  that  moves,  that  walks 
or  flies,  being  differently  born.' 

The  same  postulated  Being  is  most  fully  de- 
scribed in  hymn  X,  129,  i,  of  which  I  likewise  gave 
a  translation  in  my  '  History  of  Ancient  Sanskrit 
Literature'  (1859),  p.  569.  It  has  been  frequently 
translated  since,  but  the  meaning  has  on  the  whole 
remained  much  the  same. 

Nasadiya  Hymn. 

i.  There  was  then  neither  what  is  nor  what  is  not,  there 
was  no  sky,  nor  the  heaven  which  is  beyond.  What  covered  ? 
Where  was  it,  and  in  whose  shelter  ?  Was  the  water  the  deep 
abyss  (in  which  it  lay)? 


NASADIYA    HYMN.  65 

2.  There  was  no  death,  hence  was  there  nothing  immortal. 
There  was  no  light  (distinction)  between  night  and  day.     That 
One  breathed  by  itself  without  breath,  other  than  it  there  has 
been  nothing. 

3.  Darkness  there  was,  in  the  beginning  all  this  was  a  sea 
without  light ;  the  germ  that  lay  covered  by  the  husk,  that 
One  was  born  by  the  power  of  heat  (Tapas). 

4.  Love  overcame  it  in  the  beginning,  which  was  the  seed 
springing  from  mind  ;    poets  having  searched  in  their  heart 
found  by  wisdom  the  bond  of  what  is  in  what  is  not. 

5.  Their  ray  which  was  stretched  across,  was  it  below  or  was 
it  above?     There  were  seed-bearers,  there  were  powers,   self- 
power  below,  and  will  above. 

6.  Who  then  knows,  who  has  declared  it  here,  from  whence 
was  born  this  creation  ?    The  gods  came  later  than  this  creation, 
who  then  knows  whence  it  arose  ? 

7.  He  from  whom  this  creation  arose,  whether  he  made  it 
or  did  not  make  it,  the  Highest  Seer  in  the  highest  heaven,  he 
forsooth  knows ;  or  does  even  he  not  know  ? 

There  are  several  passages  in  this  hymn  which, 
in  spite  of  much  labour  spent  on  them  by  eminent 
scholars,  remain  as  obscure  now  as  they  were  to  me 
in  1859.  The  poet  himself  is  evidently  not  quite  clear 
in  his  own  mind,  and  he  is  constantly  oscillating 
between  a  personal  and  impersonal  or  rather  super- 
personal  cause  from  whence  the  universe  emanated. 
But  the  step  from  a  sexual  to  a  sexless  god,  from  a 
mythological  Trpcoros  to  a  metaphysical  irpw-rov,  had 
evidently  been  made  at  that  early  time,  and  with  it 
the  decisive  step  from  mythology  to  philosophy  had 
been  taken.  It  is  strange  to  meet  with  this  bold  guess 
in  a  collection  of  hymns  the  greater  part  of  which 
consists  of  what  must  seem  to  us  childish  petitions 
addressed  to  the  numerous  Devas  or  gods  of  nature. 
Even  the  question  which  in  Europe  was  asked  at 
a  much  later  date,  where  the  Creator  could  have 


66  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

found  a  TTOV  o-rco  for  creating  the  world  out  of 
matter  or  out  of  nothing,  had  evidently  passed 
through  the  minds  of  the  Vedic  seers  when  they 
asked,  Rv.  X,  8 1 ,  2  and  4 :  'What  was  the  stand,  what 
was  the  support,  what  and  how  was  it,  from  whence 
the  all-seeing  Visvakarman  produced  by  his  might 
the  earth  and  stretched  out  the  sky  ?'  These  start- 
ling outbursts  of  philosophic  thought  seem  indeed 
to  require  the  admission  of  a  long  continued  effort 
of  meditation  and  speculation  before  so  complete 
a  rupture  with  the  old  conception  of  physical  gods 
could  have  become  possible.  We  must  not,  how- 
ever, measure  every  nation  with  the  same  measure. 
It  is  not  necessary  that  the  historical  progress  of 
thought,  whether  religious  or  philosophical,  should 
have  been  exactly  the  same  in  every  country,  nor 
must  we  forget  that  there  always  have  been  pri- 
vileged individuals  whose  mind  was  untrammelled 
by  the  thoughts  of  the  great  mass  of  the  people,  and 
who  saw  and  proclaimed,  as  if  inspired  by  a  power 
not  themselves,  truths  far  beyond  the  reach  of  their 
fellow  men.  It  must  have  required  considerable 
boldness,  when  surrounded  by  millions  who  never 
got  tired  of  celebrating  the  mighty  deeds  achieved 
by  such  Devas  as  Agni,  Indra,  Soma,  Savitr/,  or 
Varu/ja,  to  declare  that  these  gods  were  nothing  but 
names  of  a  higher  power  which  was  at  first  without 
any  name  at  all,  called  simply  Tad  Ekam,  that  One, 
and  afterwards  addressed  by  such  dark  names  as 
Brahman  and  Atman.  The  poets  who  utter  these 
higher  truths  seem  fully  conscious  of  their  own 
weakness  in  grasping  them.  Thus,  in  I,  167,  5  and 
6,  the  poet  says  :— 

'As  a  fool,  ignorant  in  my  own  mind.  I  ask  for  the  hidden 


NASADlYA    HYMN.  67 

places  of  the  gods ;  the  sages,  in  order  to  weave,  stretched  the 
seven  strings  over  the  newborn  calf1.' 

'  Not  having  discovered  I  ask  the  sages  who  may  have  dis- 
covered, not  knowing,  in  order  to  know :  he  who  supported  the 
six  skies  in  the  form  of  the  unborn — was  he  perchance  that 
One?' 

And  again  in  ver.  4  of  the  same  hymn  : — 

'  Who  has  seen  the  firstborn,  when  he  who  had  no  bones 
(no  form)  bears  him  that  has  bones  (form)?  Where  is  the 
breath  of  the  earth,  the  blood,  the  self?  Who  went  to  one 
who  knows,  to  ask  this  ?  ' 

In  all  this  it  is  quite  clear  that  the  poets  them- 
selves who  proclaimed  the  great  truth  of  the  One, 
as  the  substance  of  all  the  gods,  did  not  claim  any 
inspiration  ab  extra,  but  strove  to  rise  by  their  own 
exertions  out  of  the  clouds  of  their  foolishness  towards 
the  perception  of  a  higher  truth.  The  wise,  as  they 
said,  had  perceived  in  their  heart  what  was  the 
bond  between  what  is  and  what  is  not,  between  the 
visible  and  the  invisible,  between  the  phenomenal 
and  the  real,  and  hence  also  between  the  individual 
gods  worshipped  by  the  multitude,  and  that  One 
Being  which  was  .free  from  the  character  of  a  mere 
Deva,  entirely  free  from  mythology,  from  parentage 
and  sex,  and,  if  endowed  with  personality  at  all, 
then  so  far  only  as  personality  was  necessary  for  will. 
This  was  very  different  from  the  vulgar  personality 
ascribed  by  the  Greeks  to  their  Zeus  or  Aphro- 
dite, nay  even  by  many  Jews  and  Christians  to  their 
Jehovah  or  God.  All  this  represented  an  enormous 
progress,  and  it  is  certainly  difficult  to  imagine  how 

1  This  calf  seems  meant  for  the  year,  and  in  the  seven 
strings  we  might  see  a  distant  recollection  of  a  year  of  seven 
seasons  ;  see  Galen,  v.  347.  Prar/apati  is  often  identified  with 
the  year. 

F  2 


68  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

it  could  have  been  achieved  at  that  early  period  and, 
as  it  were,  in  the  midst  of  prayers  and  sacrifices 
addressed  to  a  crowd  of  such  decidedly  personal  and 
mythological  Devas  as  Indra  and  Agni  and  all  the 
rest.  Still  it  was  achieved ;  and  whatever  is  the 
age  when  the  collection  of  our  Rig-veda-sawhita 
was  finished,  it  was  before  that  age  that  the  con- 
viction had  been  formed  that  there  is  but  One.  One 
Being,  neither  male  nor  female,  a  Being  raised  high 
above  all  the  conditions  and  limitations  of  per- 
sonality and  of  human  nature,  and  nevertheless  the 
Being  that  was  really  meant  by  all  such  names  as 
Indra,  Agni,  Matarisvan,  nay  even  by  the  name  of 
Prar/apati,  lord  of  creatures.  In  fact  the  Vedic 
poets  had  arrived  at  a  conception  of  the  Godhead 
which  was  reached  once  more  by  some  of  the  Christian 
philosophers  of  Alexandria,  but  which  even  at  pre- 
sent is  beyond  the  reach  of  many  who  call  them- 
selves Christians. 

Before  that  highest  point  of  religious  speculation 
was  reached,  or,  it  may  be,  even  at  the  same  time, 
for  chronology  is  very  difficult  to  apply  to  the 
spontaneous  intuitions  of  philosophical  truths,  many 
efforts  had  been  made  in  the  same  direction.  Such 
names  as  Brahman  and  Atman,  which  afterwards 
became  so  important  as  the  two  main  supports  of 
Vedanta-philosophy,  or  Purusha,  the  name  of  the 
transcendent  soul  as  used  in  the  Sawkhya  system, 
do  not  spring  into  life  without  a  long  previous 
incubation. 

Brahman,  its  various  Meanings. 

If  then  we  find  Bnihman  used  as  another  name 
of  what  before  was  called  Tad  Ekam,  That  One, 
if  later  on  we  meet  with  such  questions  as — 


BRAHMAN,    ITS    VARIOUS    MEANINGS.  69 

'  Was  Brahman  the  first  cause  ?  Whence  are  we 
born  ?  By  what  do  we  live  ?  Whither  are  we 
hastening  ?  By  whom  constrained  do  we  obtain 
our  lot  in  life  whether  of  happiness  or  of  misery, 

0  ye  knowers  of  Brahman  ?     Is  time,  is  the  nature 
of  things,  is  necessity,  is  accident,  are  the  elements, 
or  is  Purusha  to  be  considered  the  source  ?' 

We  naturally  ask,  first  of  all,  whence  came  these 
names  ?  What  did  Brdhman  mean  so  as  to  become 
fit  to  signify  rb  ovroos  ov  ?  It  is  curious  to  observe 
how  lightly  this  question  has  been  answered  l.  Brali- 
man,  it  was  said  by  Dr.  Haug,  means  prayer,  and 
was  derived  from  the  root  Barh  or  Bn'h,  to  swell 
or  to  grow,  so  that  originally  it  would  have  meant 
what  swells  or  grows.  He  then  assigned  to  Brah- 
man the  more  abstract  meaning  of  growth  and 
welfare,  and  what  causes  growth  and  welfare, 
namely  sacred  songs.  Lastly,  he  assigned  to  Brah- 
man the  meaning  of  force  as  manifested  in  nature, 
and  that  of  universal  force  as  the  Supreme  Being. 

1  confess  I  can  see  no  continuity  in  this  string  of 
thought.       Other    scholars,   however,    have    mostly 
repeated  the  same  view.    Dr.  Muir  starts  from  Brah- 
man in  the  sense  of  prayer,  while  with  the  ordinary 
change  of  accent  Brahman  means  he  who  prays. 

Here  the  first  question  seems  to  be  how  Brdhman 
could  have  come  to  mean  prayer.  Prof.  Roth  main- 
tained that  Brahman  expressed  the  force  of  will 
directed  to  the  gods  ;  and  he  gave  as  the  first  mean- 
ing of  Brahman,  '  Die  als  Drang  und  Fiille  des 
Gemiiths  auftretende  und  den  Goiter  n  zustrebende 
Andacht,'  words  difficult  to  render  into  intelligible 

1  M.  M.,  Theosophy,  p.  240. 


JO  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

English.  The  second  meaning,  according  to  him,  is 
a  sacred  or  magic  formula ;  then  sacred  and  divine 
words,  opposed  to  ordinary  language ;  sacred  wisdom, 
holy  life ;  lastly,  the  absolute  or  impersonal  god. 
These  are  mighty  strides  of  thought,  but  how  are 
they  to  be  derived  one  from  the  other  I 

Prof.  Deussen  (p.  i  o)  sees  in  Brahman  '  prayer,' 
the  lifting  up  of  the  will  above  one's  own  in- 
dividuality of  which  we  become  conscious  in  religious 
meditation.  I  must  confess  that  here  too  there 
seem  to  be  several  missing  links  in  the  chain  of 
meanings.  Though  the  idea  of  prayer  as  swelling 
or  exalted  thought  may  be  true  with  us,  there  is 
little,  if  any,  trace  of  such  thoughts  in  the  Veda. 
Most  of  the  prayers  there  are  very  matter-of-fact 
petitions,  and  all  that  has  been  said  of  the  swelling 
of  the  heart,  the  elevation  of  the  mind,  the  fervid 
impulse  of  the  will,  as  expressed  by  the  word  Brahman, 
seems  to  me  decidedly  modern,  and  without  any 
analogies  in  the  Veda  itself.  When  it  is  said  that  the 
hymns  make  the  gods  grow  (Vndh),this  is  little  more 
than  what  we  mean  by  saying  that  they  magnify  the 
gods  (Deussen,  1.  c.,  p.  245).  Even  if  a  more  pro- 
found intention  were  supposed  to  be  necessary  for  the 
word  Brahman  in  the  sense  of  prayer,  there  would 
be  nothing  to  prevent  its  having  originally  grown 
out  of  Brdhman  in  the  sense  of  word.  Of  course 
we  cannot  expect  perfect  certainty  in  a  matter  like 
this,  when  we  are  trying  to  discover  the  almost 
imperceptible  transitions  by  which  a  root  which 
expresses  the  idea  of  growing  forth  (Vriddhau), 
growing  strong,  bursting  forth,  increasing,  came  to 
supply  a  name  for  prayer  as  well  as  for  deity.  This 
evolution  of  thought  must  have  taken  place  long 


BRAHMAN,    ITS    VARIOUS    MEANINGS.  7! 

before  the  Vedic  period,  long  before  the  Aryan 
Separation,  long  before  the  final  constitution  of  the 
Aryan  language  of  India.  We  can  but  guess  there- 
fore, and  we  should  never  forget  this  in  trying  to 
interpret  the  faint  traces  which  the  earliest  steps 
of  the  human  mind  have  left  on  the  half-petrified 
sands  of  our  language.  That  Brahman  means  prayer 
is  certain,  and  that  the  root  BHh  meant  to  grow, 
to  break  forth,  is  equally  certain,  and  admitted  by 
all.  What  is  uncertain  are  the  intermediate  links 
connecting  the  two. 

I  suppose,  and  I  can  say  no  more,  that  Vn'h  or 
BHh,  which  I  take  to  be  a  parallel  form  of  VHdh, 
to  grow,  meant  to  grow,  to  come  forth,  to  spread. 
Hence  Brihat  means  simply  great  (like  great  from 
growing),  broad,  strong  ;  Barhish^a,  strongest.  We 
should  note,  however,  though  we  cannot  attribute 
much  importance  to  the  fact,  that  BHmhati  and 
BHmhayati  also  wrere  quoted  by  Indian  gram- 
marians in  the  sense  of  speaking  and  shining. 
Here  we  can  see  that  speaking  could  originally 
have  had  the  meaning  of  uttering,  and  that  '  word ' 
has  been  conceived  as  that  which  breaks  forth,  or 
is  uttered,  an  utterance  (Ausdruck),  as  we  say. 

The  next  step  to  consider  is  the  name  Brihas- 
pati.  We  must  start  from  the  fact  that  Brzhaspati 
is  synonymous  with  Ya/ias-pati,  lord  of  speech. 
Unless  Brih  had  once  meant  speech,  it  would  have 
been  impossible  to  form  such  a  name  as  Br/has-pati, 
as  little  as  Brahma?^as-pati  could  have  been  possible 
without  Brahman1. 


1  See  /fAand.  Up.  I,  2,  u,  vag  ghi  br/hati,  tasya  esha  patih  ; 
and  VII,  2,2,  yo  va&am  brahma  *  ity  upasate.    Cf.  Br/h.  I,  3,  20. 


72  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

From  this  point  once  gained  I  make  the  next 
step  and  suppose  that  Brdh-nlan  was  formed  to 
express  what  was  uttered,  what  broke  forth,  or 
shone  forth,  that  is,  the  word  or  speech.  ,  If  we 
have  arrived  at  this,  we  can  easily  understand  how 
the  general  concept  of  word  was  specialised  in  the 
sense  both  of  sacred  utterance  or  formula  and  of 
prayer ;  without  any  idea  of  swelling  meditation  or 
lifting  up  of  hearts,  so  alien  to  Vedic  poets,  such  as 
they  are  known  to  us.  But  if  I  am  right  in  seeing 
in  Brdhman  the  original  meaning  of  what  breaks 
forth,  of  a  force  that  manifests  itself  in  audible 
speech,  it  will  become  easy  to  understand  how 
Brahman  could  also,  from  the  very  beginning  though 
in  a  different  direction,  have  been  used  as  a  name 
of  that  universal  force  which  manifests  itself  in 
the  creation  of  a  visible  universe.  We  need  not 
suppose  that  it  had  to  ascend  a  scale  first  from 
holy  word,  holy  wisdom  to  the  source  of  that  wis- 
dom, the  absolute  god. 

Bnh  and  Brahman,  Word. 

We  may  suppose  therefore — I  say  no  more — that 
Brdhman  meant  force  or  even  germ,  so  far  as  it 
bursts  forth,  whether  in  speech  or  in  nature l.  But 
now  comes  a  much  more  perplexing  question.  It 
can  hardly  be  doubted  that  Vrih  or  BHh  is  a  parallel 
form  of  VHdh ;  and  it  is  a  well-known  fact  that  both 
the  Latin  vei'bum  and  the  German  Wort  can  be 
regularly  derived  from  the  same  root,  corresponding 
to  a  possible  Sanskrit  Vw'h-a  or  Widh-a.  In  that 

1  Divyadasa  Datta  quotes  a  passage  from  the  YogavasishMa : 
'  Brahmavn'wihaiva  hi  ^agarj,  ^/aga/c  A'a  brahmavnwhanam 
(Vedantism,  p.  28). 


Bfl/H    AND    BRAHMAN,    WORD.  73 

case  Brd,h  man  also  may  be  taken  as  a  direct  deri- 
vation in  the  sense  of  the  uttered  word,  and 
brahman  as  the  speaker,  the  utterer.  So  far  we 
are  still  on  safe  ground,  and  in  the  present  state 
of  our  knowledge  I  should  not  venture  to  go  much 
beyond.  But  Colebrooke  and  other  Vedic  scholars 
have  often  pointed  out  the  fact  that  in  the  Veda 
already  we  find  a  goddess  Va&,  speech,  which  we 
met  in  Va&as-pati  and  BHhas-pdti  *,  the  lord  of 
speech.  This  Va&,  as  Colebrooke  pointed  out  as 
early  as  1805,  was  'the  active  power  of  Brahma, 
proceeding  from  him2.'  After  reading  Colebrooke's 
remarks  on  it,  few  Sanskrit  scholars  could  help 
being  reminded  of  the  Logos  or  the  Word  that  was 
in  the  beginning,  that  was  with  God,  and  by  whom 
all  things  were  made.  The  important  question, 
however,  which,  even  after  Colebrooke's  remarks, 
remained  still  undecided,  was  whether  this  idea  of 
the  creative  Word  was  borrowed  by  the  Greeks  from 
India,  or  by  the  Indians  from  Greece,  or  whether 
it  was  an  idea  that  sprang  up  independently  in 
both  countries.  This  is  a  question  the  answer  of 
which  must  lead  to  the  most  far-reaching  con- 
sequences. Professor  Weber  in  his  'Indische  Studien,' 
IX,  473,  published  an  article  with  the  object  of 
showing  that  '  the  Logos-idea  had  no  antecedents 
in  Greece  to  account  for  it.'  This  was  certainly 
a  startling  assertion,  but  in  the  face  of  well-known 
facts  he  added  :  '  Without  wishing  to  give  a  de- 

1  In  the  Rig-veda  we  have  only  va'/ca/i  pate,  X,  166,  3,  as  two 
words;  and  again  patiw  vaA'a/i,  IX,  26,  4.     Brahma^as  pati/i 
occurs   frequently   in    Eig-veda,    as  II,  23,   i,  gyeshtharag&m 
brahnia^am.  brahma^as  pate,  &c. 

2  Miscellaneous  Essays,  I,  p.  28. 


74  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

cision  on  this  question,  the  surmise  is  obvious, 
considering  the  close  relations  at  that  time  existing 
between  Alexandria  and  India,  that  the  growth  of 
this  Neoplatonic  idea  was  influenced  by  the  like 
views  of  the  philosophical  systems  of  India.'  He 
says  again,  '  that  it  may  have  been  simply  on 
account  of  the  invigorating  influence  which  the  gods 
were  believed  to  derive  from  the  hymns,  that  the 
goddess  of  Speech  was  conceived  as  furnishing  to 
Pra^/apati  the  strength  of  creation,  though  at  last, 
particularly  in  the  shape  of  Om,  she  obtained  the 
highest  position,  being  identified  with  the  absolute 
Brahman.' 

I  hope  I  have  thus  given  a  correct  account  of 
Professor  Weber's  somewhat  vague  yet  startling 
assertion,  that  the  Alexandrian  Logos  idea  had  no 
antecedents  in  Greek  philosophy,  but  was  influenced 
by  the  Vedic  VaA;.  There  are,  no  doubt,  similarities, 
but  there  are  dissimilarities  also  which  ought  not 
to  be  ignored.  To  say  nothing  else,  VaA'  is  a 
feminine,  Logos  a  masculine,  and  that  involves  more 
than  a  difference  of  grammatical  gender. 

I  have  tried  to  show  in  my  '  Lectures  on  Theo- 
sophy,'  that  the  facts  of  the  case  lead  us  to  a  very 
different,  nay  to  the  very  opposite  opinion.  If  I 
did  not  enter  on  a  discussion  of  the  arguments 
which  were  intended  to  prove  the  absence  of 
antecedents  of  the  Alexandrian  Logos  idea  in  Greek 
philosophy,  it  was  because  I  thought  it  better  to 
state  the  facts  as  they  really  are,  without  entering 
on  any  useless  controversy,  leaving  classical  and 
Sanskrit  scholars  to  form  their  own  conclusions. 
While  Professor  Weber  had  asserted  that  the  Logos 
appears  in  Alexandria  without  any  preparatory  steps, 


BtfTH    AND    BRAHMAN,    WORD.  75 

I  did  my  best  to  point  out  these  very  steps  leading 
up  to  the  Logos,  which  are  very  well  known  to  every 
student  of  the  early  history  of  Greek  philosophy1. 
If  I  have  succeeded  in  this,  the  presumption  in 
favour  of  any  Indian  influence  having  been  exercised 
on  the  philosophers  of  Alexandria,  would  fall  to  the 
ground  of  itself,  and  the  claims  of  India  and 
Greece  would  be  equal  so  far  as  the  original  idea 
of  the  Word,  as  a  potentia  of  the  absolute  Being, 
was  concerned.  '  Real  Indian  philosophy,'  I  had 
said  before,  '  even  in  that  embryonic  form  in  which 
we  find  it  in  the  Upanishads,  stands  completely 
by  itself.  We  cannot  claim  for  it  any  historical 
relationship  with  the  earliest  Greek  philosophy. 
The  two  are  as  independent  of  each  other  as  the 
Greek  Charis,  when  she  has  become  the  wife  of 
Hephaestos,  is  of  the  Haritas,  the  red  horses 
of  the  Vedic  Dawn'  (p.  79). 

Then  the  question  arose,  was  there  at  least  a 
distant  relationship,  such  as  exists  between  Charis 
and  the  Haritas,  between  Zeus  and  Dyaus,  between 
VaA;  and  the  Logos  also  ?  As  there  were  no  lin- 
guistic indications  whatever  in  support  of  such  a 
view,  I  arrived  in  the  end  at  the  conclusion,  that 
striking  as  are  the  coincidences  between  the  Vedic 
Va&  and  the  Greek  Logos,  we  must  here  also  admit 
that  what  was  possible  in  India  was  possible  in  Greece 
likewise,  and  that  we  have  no  evidence  to  support  us 
in  any  further  conclusions.  In  all  this  I  thought 
that  facts  would  speak  far  better  than  words.  It  is 
quite  true  that  Professor  Weber  was  careful  to  add 

1  Theosophy,  p.  384,  The  Historical  Antecedents  of  the 
Logos. 


76  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  clause  '  that  he  did  not  intend  to  give  any 
opinion  on  this  question/  hut  after  such  a  confession 
it  is  hardly  becoming  to  hint  that  those  who  have 
given  an  opinion  on  this  question,  had  derived  their 
information  from  him.  It  is  easy  to  state  the  pros 
and  cons,  the  Purvapaksha  and  the  Uttarapaksha, 
but  both  are  meant  in  the  end  to  lead  on  to 
the  Siddhanta,  the  conclusion.  Even  stronger 
coincidences  between  VaA;  and  the  Sophia  of  the 
Old  Testament 1  might  have  been  adduced,  for  as 
we  read  of  Va&  as  the  companion  of  Pra(/apati 2, 
Wisdom,  in  Prov.  viii.  30,  is  made  to  say,  '  I  was  by 
him,  as  one  brought  up  with  him  ;  and  I  was  daily 
his  delight,  rejoicing  always  before  him.' 

While  in  the  Kanaka  we  read  of  VaX*  being 
impregnated  by  Pra</apati,  we  read  in  Prov.  viii.  22, 
'  The  Eternal  possessed  me  in  the  beginning  of  his 
way,  before  his  works  of  old.' 

But  with  all  this  I  cannot  admit  that  there  is 
any  evidence  of  borrowing  or  of  any  kind  of  in- 
teraction between  Indian  and  Greek  philosophy, 
and  I  should  have  thought  that  after  the  historical 
antecedents  of  the  Logos  and  the  Logoi  in  Greece 
had  been  clearly  laid  open,  the  idea  of  the  Greeks 
having  borrowed  their  Logos  from  Vedic  VaA-  or 
from  the  0.  T.  Sophia,  would  not  have  been  re- 
vived. The  historical  consequences  of  such  an 
admission  would  carry  us  very  far  indeed,  and  it 
would  require  a  far  stronger  lever  to  lift  and  to 
remove  the  weight  of  evidence  on  the  other  side . 
than  the  arguments  hitherto  brought  forward.  If 

1  M.  M.,  Theosophy,  p.  381. 

2  KAMaka  12,  5  (27,  i). 


EAST    AND    WEST.  77 

the  Greeks  had  really  borrowed  their  idea  of  the 
Logos  from  India,  why  should  they  not  have  adopted 
any  of  the  consequences  that  followed  from  it  ? 

East  and  West. 

This  requires  some  fuller  consideration.  Every 
indication  of  a  possible  intellectual  intercourse 
between  Greeks  and  Hindus  in  ancient  as  well  as 
in  more  modern  times,  has  been  carefully  noted  and 
strongly  urged  of  late,  but  I  feel  bound  to  say  that, 
particularly  for  ancient  times,  nothing  beyond  mere 
possibilities  of  an  exchange  of  religious  or  philoso- 
phical ideas  between  Greece  and  India  has  as  yet 
been  established.  It  seems  not  to  have  been  perceived 
that  an  exchange  of  philosophical  thought  is  very 
different  from  an  adoption  of  useful  arts,  such  as 
alphabetic  writing,  astronomical  observations,  coined 
money,  or  articles  of  trade  whether  jewels,  wood,  or 
clothing  materials.  It  is  only  a  philosopher  that 
can  teach  or  influence  a  philosopher,  and  even  in 
the  cases  of  two  such  men  meeting,  the  difficulties  of 
an  interchange  of  thought,  without  a  perfect  know- 
ledge of  the  languages,  are  far  greater  than  we 
imagine.  We  have  an  instance  of  a  foreign  philoso- 
pher becoming  a  proficient  in  the  philosophical 
language  of  India  in  the  case  of  Hiouen-thsang.  Has 
he  left  any  trace  of  Chinese  thought,  whether  de- 
rived from  Confucius  or  Lao-tze,  in  India  ?  Modern 
missionaries,  if  unsuccessful  in  conversions,  may,  no 
doubt,  have  left  some  imprint  of  Christianity  and 
European  philosophy  on  the  native  mind,  but  the 
position  of  the  Christian  missionary  in  India,  ac- 
credited by  membership  in  the  ruling  race,  is  very 
different  from  what  the  position  of  a  few  Buddhist 


78  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

monks  could  possibly  have  been  in  ancient  times,  even 
if  they  had  reached  Alexandria,  and  learnt  to  speak 
and  converse  on  certain  subjects  in  Greek  or  Egyptian. 
A  courier  may  be  very  conversant  with  French  or 
Italian,  but  let  him  try  to  discuss  metaphysical 
questions,  or  even  to  translate  a  book  of  Vico's  into 
English,  and  it  will  be  perceived  what  difference 
there  is  between  an  interpreter  and  a  philosopher 
capable  of  discussing  religious  and  metaphysical 
problems. 

That  there  was  a  time  when  the  ancestors  of  the 
Aryan  speakers  had  the  same  language  and  held 
many  of  their  mythological  and  religious  names  and 
ideas  in  common,  is  no  longer  doubted,  though,  even 
here,  we  must  be  satisfied  with  names,  and  could  not 
expect  common  mythological  speculations.  Later 
contact  between  Indians  and  Greeks,  whether  in 
Persia,  Asia  Minor  or  Greece,  assumed  no  importance 
till  we  come  to  the  invasion  of  Asia  Minor,  Persia,  and 
India  by  Alexander  the  Great.  But  long  before  that 
time  both  Greeks  and  Hindus  had  invented  many 
tilings,  such  as  kings,  priests,  numbers,  and  seasons, 
marriages  and  funerals,  without  our  having  to  imagine 
that  there  was  at  that  time  any  exchange  of  ideas 
between  the  two  countries  on  such  points.  If  then 
we  meet  in  India  as  well  as  in  Greece  with  similar 
philosophic  ideas,  as,  for  instance,  with  a  name 
meaning  atom  and  with  the  atomic  theory,  should 
we  suggest  at  once  that  Epicurus  must  have  borrowed 
his  atoms  from  Kanada,  or  Kanada  his  Anus  from 
Epicurus  ?  It  is  interesting,  no  doubt,  to  point  out 
coincidences  between  Kapila  and  Zenon.  Pythagoras, 
Plato  and  Aristotle,  but  it  is  even  more  interesting 
to  point  out  the  shades  of  difference  in  cases  where 


EAST    AND    WEST.  79 

they  seem  most  to  agree.  If  the  Vedanta  could 
elaborate  an  ideal  Monism,  why  not  the  Eleatics  as 
well  ?  And  yet  where  is  there  a  trace  of  such  a 
philosophical  theory  as  the  absolute  identity  of 
Atman  (the  Self),  and  Brahman  (the  absolute  being), 
to  be  found  in  Greek  philosophy  ?  Who  would  see 
more  than  a  very  natural  coincidence  between  the 
Sanskrit  triad  of  Dharma,  virtue,  Artha,  wealth, 
Kama,  love,  and  the  Platonic  TO,  KaXd,  what  is  good,  TO, 
o»0eAi/ia3  what  is  useful,  and  TO,  -fjSea  what  is  pleasant  ? 
How  widely  the  triad  of  thought,  word,  and  deed 
is  spread  has  been  shown  very  clearly  by  my  old 
friend  Professor  Co  well  and  others,  but  no  one 
would  venture  to  accuse  either  Greeks  or  Indians  of 
borrowing  or  of  theft  on  such  evidence. 

The  real  character  of  most  of  these  coincidences 
between  Greek  and  Hindu  philosophy,  is  best 
exhibited  by  the  often  attempted  identification  of 
the  names  of  Pythagoras  and  Buddha-guru.  At 
first  sight  it  is  certainly  startling,  but  if  traced  back 
to  its  origin,  it  evaporates  completely.  First  of  all, 
Buddha-guru  does  not  occur,  least  of  all  as  a  name 
of  the  teacher  Buddha,  and  whether  as  a  common 
Aryan  name  or  as  borrowed,  Pytha  could  never  be 
the  same  as  Buddha,  or  Goras  as  Guru.  The  belief 
in  transmigration  among  the  Buddhists,  besides 
being  borrowed  from  the  Veda,  is  very  different  from 
that  of  Pythagoras  and  other  philosophers,  both 
civilised  and  uncivilised,  while  ascetic  practices  were 
certainly  not  confined  to  either  India  or  Greece. 

It  is  quite  true  that  after  Alexander's  conquests, 
and  after  the  establishment  of  a  Bactrian  kingdom, 
in  the  North  of  India,  there  was  a  more  real  intercourse 
even  between  philosophers  of  Greek  and  Indian  origin, 


8o  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  many  of  the  facts  bearing  on  this  subject  have 
been  very  carefully  put  together  by  Count  Goblet 
d'Alviella  in  his  Ce  que  I'lnde  doit  a  la  Grece,  1897. 
But  even  he  brings  forward  coincidences,  which 
require  more  convincing  proofs.  With  regard  to 
Indian  coinage,  it  should  be  observed  that  the  three 
gods  mentioned  by  Patafkjrali  as  used  for  commerce, 
i.e.  on  coins,  are  the  very  gods  found  on  the  earliest 
Mauryan  coins,  >Siva,  Skanda,  and  Visakha,  cf.  Psm. 
V,  3 5  99  >  provided  that  Visakha  can  refer  to  Kama 
shooting  his  arrows  ? 

It  cannot  be  doubted  that  the  art  of  coining  money 
was  introduced  into  India  by  the  Greeks,  and  if  the 
images  of  Indian  gods  and  even  of  Buddha  on  ancient 
coins,  may  be  supposed  to  have  favoured  idolatry  in 
India,  that  too  may  be  admitted.  Indian  gods,  how- 
ever, were  anthropomorphic,  had  legs  and  arms,  heads, 
noses  and  eyes,  as  early  as  the  Veda,  and  the  absence 
of  workable  stone  in  many  parts  of  India  would 
naturally  have  been  unfavourable  to  a  development 
of  sculptured  idols.  The  Hindus  had  a  god  of  love  in 
the  Veda,  but  he  was  very  different  from  the  Kama, 
imaged  on  more  modern  coins  as  an  archer  sitting 
on  the  back  of  a  parrot. 

We  are  now  in  possession  of  specimens  of  much 
earlier  Greek  workmanship  in  India,  than  this  Kama 
on  the  back  of  a  parrot,  nor  is  there  any  reason  to 
doubt  that  the  idea  of  temples  or  monasteries  or 
monuments,  built  and  carved  in  stone,  came  from 
Greece,  while  some  of  the  Indian  architecture,  even 
when  in  stone,  shows  as  clear  surviving  traces  of 
a  native  wood-architecture  as,  for  instance,  the 
Lycian  tombs. 

The  later  influence  which  Christianity  is  supposed 


EAST    AND    WEST.  8 1 

to  have  exercised  in  originating  or  in  powerfully 
influencing  the  sectarian  worship  of  K?'istma  does  not 
concern  us  here,  for,  if  it  should  be  admitted  at  all, 
it  would  have  to  be  referred  to  a  much  later  period 
than  that  which  gave  rise  to  the  six  systems  of 
philosophy.  Ever  since  the  beginning  of  Sanskrit 
studies,  nay  even  before,  these  startling  similarities 
between  Krishna  and  Christos  have  been  pointed  '^ 
out  again  and  again.  But  iteration  yields  no  strength 
to  argument,  and  we  are  as  far  as  ever  from  being 
able  to  point  to  any  historical  channel  through 
which  the  legends  of  Christ  or  Kn'srma  could  have 
travelled.  No  one  can  deny  the  similarities,  such 
as  they  are,  but  no  one,  I  believe,  can  account  for 
them.  Some  of  those  who  have  been  most  anxious  to 
gather  coincidences  between  the  Bhagavad-gitsi  and 
the  New  Testament,  have  been  rightly  warned  by 
native  scholars  themselves,  that  they  should  learn 
to  translate  both  Sanskrit  and  Greek  before  they 
venture  to  compare.  It  should  not  be  forgotten  j 
that  as  the  Bhagavad-gita  bears  the  title  of  Upani- 
shad,  it  may  belong  to  the  end  of  the  Upanishad- 
period,  and  may,  as  the  late  Professor  Telang 
maintained,  be  older  even  than  the  New  Testament. 
If  Damascius  tells  us  that  there  were  Brahmans 
living  at  Alexandria  l,  we  must  not  forget  that  this 
refers  to  the  end  of  the  fifth  century  A.  D.,  and 
does  not  help  us  much  even  as  indicating  the  way 
by  which  the  idea  of  the  Creative  Word  could 
have  reached  Clement  of  Alexandria  or  Origen. 
That  Clement  of  Alexandria  knew  the  name  of 
Butta  is  well  known,  he  even  knew  that  he  had 

1  See  Goblet  d'Alviella,  I.e.,  p.  167. 
G 


82  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

been  taken  for  a  god.  Nor  should  it  be  forgotten, 
that  Pantaenus  who,  according  to  Eusebius,  had 
preached  the  Gospel  in  India,  was  one  of  the  teachers 
of  Clement.  But  all  this  is  far  from  proving  that 
Clement  or  Origen  was  able  to  study  the  Vedanta- 
Sutras  or  the  Buddhist  Abhidharmas,  or  that  their 
opinions  were  influenced  by  a  few  Indian  travellers 
staying  at  Alexandria  who  cared  for  none  of  these 
things. 

Some  of  the  coincidences  between  Buddhism  and 
Christianity  are  certainly  startling,  particularly  by 
their  number,  but  in  several  cases  they  exist  on 
the  surface  only  and  are  not  calculated  to  carry 
conviction  on  one  side  or  the  other.  I  have  treated 
of  them  on  several  occasions,  for  the  last  time  in  my 
paper  on  '  Coincidences,'  but  the  same  coincidences, 
which  have  been  proved  to  be  anything  but  real 
coincidences,  are  repeated  again  and  again.  The 
story  of  Buddha  sitting  under  an  Indian  fig-tree 
(faux  religiosa)  has  nothing  whatever  in  common 
with  Nathaniel  sitting  under  a  Palestinian  fig-tree, 
and  the  parable  of  the  Prodigal  Son  in  the  Buddhist 
scriptures  is  surely  very  different  in  spirit  from  that 
in  the  New  Testament.  There  remain  quite  sufficient 
similarities  to  startle  and  perplex  us,  without  our 
dragging  in  what  has  no  power  of  proving  anything-. 
No  critical  historian  would  listen  for  one  moment  to 
such  arguments  as  have  been  used  to  establish  a  real 
exchange  of  thought  between  India  and  Europe  in 
ancient  times.  On  this  point  we  owe  a  great  deal 
to  students  of  ethnology,  who  have  pointed  out 
coincidences  quite  as  startling  between  the  religious 
and  philosophical  folklore  of  uncivilised  and  civilised 
faces,  without  venturing  to  suggest  any  borrowing 


EAST    AND    WEST.  83 


or  any  historical  community  of  origin.  The 
bridge,  for  instance,  which  seems  so  peculiar  to  the 
Persians,  had  its  antecedents  as  far  back  as  the 
Veda,  and  is  matched  by  a  similar  bridge  among 
the  North  American  Indians  2.  I  say,  a  similar 
bridge,  for  it  differs  also,  as  I  pointed  out,  very 
characteristically  from  the  Persian  bridge.  Again, 
it  is  well  known  that  the  creation  of  the  world  by 
the  Word  has  been  discovered  among  so  low  a  race 
as  the  Klamaths  3,  but  no  one  has  ventured  to  say 
that  the  two  accounts  had  a  common  origin  or  were 
borrowed  one  from  the  other.  This  should  serve  as 
a  useful  warning  to  those  who  are  so  fond  of  suggest- 
ing channels  through  which  Indian  thought  might 
have  influenced  Palestine  or  Greece,  and  vice  versa. 
No  doubt,  such  channels  were  there  ;  neither 
mountains  nor  seas  would  have  formed  impassable 
barriers.  Besides,  Buddhism,  as  early  as  the  third 
century  B.C.,  was  certainly  a  missionary  religion 
quite  as  much  as  Christianity  was  at  a  later  time. 
Alexandria  was  known  by  name,  as  Alasando,  to 
the  author  of  the  Mahavamsa  4.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  name  of  King  Gondaphoros,  who  is  mentioned 
in  the  legend  of  St.  Thomas'  travels  to  India,  has 
been  authenticated  on  Indo-Parthian  coins  as  Gondo- 
phares,  likewise  the  name  of  his  nephew  Abdayases, 
and  possibly,  according  to  M.  S.  Levi,  that  of 
Vasu  Deva  as  Misdeos.  All  this  is  true,  and  shows 
that  the  way  between  Alexandria  and  Benares  was 
wide  open  in  the  first  century  A.  D.  Nor  should 

1  Contributions  to  the  Science  of  Mythology. 

2  Theosophy,  p.  168.  3  Theosophy,  p.  383. 
4  Le  Comte  d'Alviella.  I.e.,  p.  177. 

G  2 


84  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

it  have  been  forgotten  that  in  the  Dialogues  between 
Milinda  and  Nagasena  we  have  a  well  authenticated 
case  of  a  Greek  king  (Menandros),  and  of  a  Buddhist 
philosopher,  discussing  together  some  of  the  highest 
problems  of  philosophy  and  religion.  All  this  is  true, 
and  yet  we  are  as  far  as  ever  from  having  discovered 
a  Greek  or  Indian  go-between  in  flagrante  delicto. 
We  have  before  us  ever  so  many  possibilities,  nay 
even  probabilities,  but  we  could  not  expect  any 
bond  jide  historian  to  accept  any  one  of  them  as 
a  proof  of  a  real  influence  having  been  exercised 
by  Greece  on  India  or  by  India  on  Greece,  at 
a  time  when  Greek  philosophy  and  religion  might 
still  have  been  amenable  to  Eastern  guides,  or 
Indian  schools  of  thought  might  have  gratefully 
received  fresh  impulses  from  the  West.  Though  the 
literature  of  India  has  no  trustworthy  chronology, 
still,  unless  the  whole  structure  of  the  literary  develop- 
ment of  India  is  once  more  to  be  revolutionised, 
we  can  hardly  imagine  that  the  occurrence  of  such 
names  as  Bodda  and  Zarades  (Zoroaster)  among 
the  followers  of  Mani,  or  that  of  Terebinthos  the 
pupil  of  Scythianos l,  the  very  founder  of  the 
Manichaean  sect  in  Babylon,  would  help  us  to 
discover  the  secret  springs  of  the  wisdom  of  Kapila 
or  Buddha  /SVikya  Muni.  They  may  point  out 
whence  these  heresiarchs  derived  their  wisdom,  but 
they  leave  the  question  which  concerns  us  here 
totally  untouched.  Gorres,  in  spite  of  all  his  mysti- 
cism, was  right  when  he  looked  for  a  similarity 

1  It  has  been  suggested  that  Scythianos  may  have  been  an 
adaptation  of  .S'akya  the  Scythian,  a  name  of  Buddha,  and 
Terebinthos  may  contain  traces  of  Thera  (elder).  All  this  is 
possible,  but  no  more. 


EAST    AND    WEST.  85 

in  technical  terms  in  order  to  establish  an  Indian 
influence  on  Greek  or  a  Greek  influence  on  Indian 
philosophy.  His  principle  was  right,  though  he 
applied  it  wrongly.  It  is  the  same  as  in  Com- 
parative Mythology.  There  may  be  ever  so  many 
similarities  between  two  mythologies,  such  as  changes 
of  men  and  women  into  animals  or  plants,  worship 
of  trees  and  ancestors,  belief  in  spirits  and  visions 
in  sleep  or  dreams,  but  one  such  equation  as  Dyaus  = 
Zeus,  is  more  convincing  than  all  of  them  taken 
together.  If  people  ask  why,  they  might  as  well 
ask  why  the  discovery  of  one  coin  with  the  name 
of  Augustus  on  it  is  a  more  convincing  proof  of 
Roman  influence  in  India  than  the  discovery  of 
ever  so  many  pieces  of  uncoined  gold. 

To  return  to  the  origin  of  the  word  Brahman. 
Tempting l  as  the  distant  relationship  between  Bra'h- 
man  and  ~Brih,  in  the  sense  of  speech,  with  verbum 
and  Word  may  be,  we  could  not  admit  it  without 
admitting  at  the  same  time  a  community  of  thought, 
and  of  deep  philosophical  thought,  at  a  period 


1  There  is  a  curious  passage  in  Bhartnhari's  BrahmakawcZa 
which  seems  to  identify  Speech  and  Brahman.  See  Sarva- 
darsana-sangraha,  Bibl.  Ind.,  p.  140: — • 

Anadinidhanam  Ibrahma  sabdatattvam  yad  aksharam, 

Vivartate*rthabhavena  prakriya  gag&to  yatha. 

Brahman  without  beginning  or  end,  which  is  the  eternal 

essence  of  speech, 
Is  changed  into  the  form  of  things,  like  the  evolution 

of  the  world. 

Equally  strong  is  the  statement  of  Madhava  himself,  Sphote- 
khyo  niravayavo  nitya/i  sabdo  brahmaiveti,  '  The  eternal  word 
which  is  called  Spho^a  and  does  not  consist  of  parts,  is  indeed 
Brahman.' 


86  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

previous  to  the  Aryan  Separation ;  and  we  certainly 
have  no  evidence  sufficiently  strong  to  support  so 
bold  a  hypothesis.  What  we  may  carry  away 
from  a  consideration  of  the  facts  hitherto  examined 
is  that  in  India  itself  Brahman,  as  a  name  of  the 
TrpvTov  KIVOVV,  need  not  have  passed  through  a  stage 
when  Brdhman  meant  prayer  only,  and  that  Brah- 
man, prayer,  could  not  have  assumed  the  meaning  of 
the  object  of  prayers,  that  is,  the  Universal  Spirit, 
who  never  required  any  prayers  at  all. 

In  order  to  show  what  direction  the  thoughts 
connected  with  Va&  took  in  the  Veda,  I  shall  first 
of  all  subjoin  here  a  few  passages  from  the  hymns, 
the  Brahma?ias  and  Upanishads  : — 

Va£,  speech,  speaking  in  her  own  name,  is  intro- 
duced in  hymn  X,  125,  also  in  Atharva-veda  IV,  30, 
as  saying  : — 

'  i.  I  wander  with  the  Vasus  and  the  Kudras, 
I  wander  with  the  Adityas  and  the  Visve  Devas, 
I  support  Mitra  and  Varima  both,  I  support  Agni 
and  the  two  Asvins ; 

2.  I    support    the    swelling  (?)    Soma,    I    support 
Tvashfr't  and  Pushan  and  Bhaga.    I  bestow  wealth  on 
the  zealous  offerer,  on  the  sacrificer  who  presses  Soma. 

3.  I   am   the   queen,  the   gatherer  of  riches,  the 
knowing,    first    of  those    who    merit    worship ;    the 
gods    have   thus   established   me    in    many    places, 
staying  with  many,  entering  into  many. 

4.  By  me  it  is  that  he  who  sees,  he  who  breathes, 
lie  who  hears  what  is  spoken,   eats  food  ;    without 
knowing  it,  they  rest  on  me.     Hear,  one  and  all ! 
1   tell  thee  what  I  believe.   (?) 

5.  I,    even    I    myself,  say   this,  what   is   good   for 
gods,  and  also  for  men  ;    whomsoever   I   love,   him 


EAST    AND    WEST.  87 

I  make   formidable,  him  I  make   a  Brahman,   him 
a  Rishi,  him  a  sage. 

6.  I  bend  the  bow  for  Rudra  (the  storm-god)  that 
his  arrow  may  strike  the  hater  of  Brahman  ;  I  make 
war  for  the  people,  I   have    entered   both   heaven 
and  earth. 

7.  I  bring  forth  the  (my  ?)  father  (Dyaus)  on  the 
summit  of  this  world,  my  origin  is  in  the  waters, 
in  the  sea ;   from  thence  I  spread  over  all   beings, 
and  touch  yonder  heaven  with  my  height. 

8.  I  indeed  spread  forth  like  the   wind,   to  lay 
hold   011   all   things,   beyond  the  sky,   beyond  the 
earth  ;  such  have  I  become  through  my  greatness.' 

I  ask  is  there  any  trace  in  these  utterances  of  the 
thoughts  that  led  in  the  end  to  the  conception  of 
the  Greek  Logos?  There  is  another  hymn  (X,  71) 
which  is  very  obscure  and  has  for  the  first  time 
been  rendered  more  intelligible  by  Professor  Deussen 
(A.  G.  P.,  p.  148),  where  we  meet  with  some  im- 
portant remarks  showing  that  language  formed  an 
object  of  thought  even  at  that  early  time.  But 
here  also  there  is  nothing,  as  yet,  approaching  to 
the  conception  of  the  Word  as  a  creative  power. 
We  meet  with  such  observations  as  that  words 
were  made  in  the  beginning  in  order  to  reveal  what 
before  had  been  hidden.  This  is,  no  doubt,  an 
important  thought,  showing  that  those  who  uttered 
it  had  not  yet  ceased,  like  ourselves,  to  wonder  at 
the  existence  of  such  a  thing  as  language.  The 
struggle  for  life  that  is  going  on  among  words  is 
alluded  to  by  saying  that  the  wise  made  speech  by 
mind  (Manas),  sifting  as  by  a  sieve  the  coarsely 
ground  flour.  The  power  of  speech  is  greatly  ex- 
tolled, and  eloquence  is  celebrated  as  a  precious 


88  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

gift.  All  men  shout  when  the  eloquent  man  ap- 
pears, holding  the  assembly  subdued  or  spellbound 
by  his  words  (Sabhasaha),  nay  he  is  supposed  to 
remove  all  sin  and  to  procure  sustenance  for  his 
friends.  The  knowledge  of  all  things  or,  as  Deussen 
says,  the  knowledge  of  the  origin  of  things,  is 
taught  by  the  Brahman. 

We  meet  with  passages  of  a  very  similar  character, 
in  various  parts  of  the  Brahmanas.  One  of  the  most 
startling  is  found  in  a  verse  inserted  in  the  Purusha- 
hymn,as  given  in  the  Taittiriya-aranyaka  (III,  12,17), 
'  I  know  that  great  sun -coloured  Punish  a,  when  on 
the  verge  of  darkness,  he,  the  wise,  rests,  addressing 
them,  after  having  thought  all  forms,  and  having 
made  their  names.'  Here  we  have  only  to  translate 
forms  by  e'i'Sr),  and  names  by  Aoyof,  and  we  shall 
not  be  very  far  from  the  world  of  thought  in  which 
Plato  and  Aristotle1  moved. 

But  although  we  can  discover  in  this  hymn  an 
appreciation  of  the  mysterious  nature  of  speech,  we 
look  in  vain  for  the  clear  and  definite  idea  that 
language  and  thought  are  one,  which  can  be  so 
clearly  read  in  the  Greek  word  Logos,  both  word 
and  thought,  nor  do  we  find  more  than  slight 
anticipations  of  the  Neo-platonist  dogma  that  the 
creation  of  the  universe  was  in  reality  an  utter- 
ance of  the  hidden  thoughts  and  words  of  the 
Deity. 

Mind  and  Speech. 

The  following  passages  will  give  some  idea  of 
what  was  thought  in  India  about  mind  and  lan- 
guage and  their  mutual  relation.  They  may  be 


Sec  Deussen,  I.e.,  p.  290. 


MIND    AND    SPEECH.  89 

vague  and  mystical,  but  they  show  at  all  events  that 
a  good  deal  of  thought  must  have  been  expended 
by  the  early  thinkers  of  India  on  this  problem,  the 
nature  of  speech  and  the  relation  between  speech  and 
thought. 

$atap.  Brahmana  VI,  i,  i :  'Pra^apati,  after  having 
created  the  Veda  (Brahman,  neut.),  created  the 
waters  out  of  Va&  (speech),  for  Va&  was  his.  That 
was  created  (sent  forth).  He  then  entered  the 
waters  with  Brahman,  i.e.  the  threefold  Veda,  and 
there  arose  from  the  water  an  egg  which  he  touched 
and  commanded  to  multiply.  Then  from  the  egg 
there  arose  first  Brahman,  neut.,  that  is,  the  three- 
fold Veda.' 

Paft&avimsa  Brahmana  XX,  14,  2  :  '  Pra(/apati 
alone  was  this,  and  Va&  was  his  own,  Va&  as  the 
second.  He  thought,  Let  me  create  (send  forth) 
this  Va&,  for  she  will  go  and  become  all  this.' 

$atap.  Brahm.  VII,  5,  2,  21  :  '  The  unborn  is  Va/j, 
and  from  Va&  Visvakarman  (the  all-maker)  begat 
living  beings.' 

Bn'h.  Ar.  Up.  I,  5,  3  :  'The  Atman  consists  of 
speech,  mind,  and  breath.  There  are  also  the  three 
worlds  ;  speech  is  this  world,  mind  the  air,  breath 
the  sky.  The  same  are  the  three  Vedas,  speech 
the  Eig-veda,  mind  the  Ya^/ur-veda,  breath  the 
Sama-veda.  The  same  are  gods,  ancestors,  and 
men,  speech  the  gods,  mind  the  ancestors,  breath 
men,  &c.' 

~Brih.  Ar.  Up.  I,  i,  24  :  'He  desired,  let  a  second 
body  be  born  of  me,  and  he  (death  or  hunger)  em- 
braced speech  with  his  mind.' 

And  ibid.  I,  4,  17  :  'This  world  in  the  beginning 
was  Atman  (Self),  alone  and  lonely.  He  desired, 


90  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

May  I  have  a  wife  .  .  .  Manas  (mind)  is  the  Self, 
speech  the  wife,  breath  the  child.' 

The  same  or  very  similar  and  often  contradictory 
ideas  occur  in  later  works  also.  Thus  we  read  in 
Manu  I,  2 1  :  'In  the  beginning  he  (Brahma) 
fashioned  from  the  words  of  the  Veda,  the  several 
names,  works,  and  conditions  of  all  things.' 

And  to  quote  but  one  passage  from  the  Maha- 
bharata,  /Santi-parva,  8533  :  'In  the  beginning 
Vidya  (knowledge,  Sophia)  without  beginning  or 
end,  the  divine  Va&  (speech)  of  the  Vedas,  wras  sent 
forth  by  Svayambhu,  the  self-existent.' 

>Sa??ikara,  when  treating  of  Sphofa1  (word),  of  which 
we  shall  have  to  treat  further  on,  quotes  from  the 
Br/h.  Ar.  Up.  1, 2,  4 :  '  He  with  his  mind  united  himself 
with  speech,'  and  he  adds  an  important  verse  from 
some  Snu'iti :  '  In  the  beginning  divine  Va&,  Speech, 
eternal,  without  beginning  or  end,  consisting  of 
Veda,  was  uttered  by  Svayambhu,  from  which  all 
activities  proceeded ' ; 

And  again  :  '  In  the  beginning  Mahe,svara  shaped 
from  the  words  of  the  Veda  the  names  and  forms 
of  all  beings  and  the  procedure  of  all  acti\'ties.' 

The  Laws  of  Manu,  or,  more  correctly,  of  the 
Manavas,  the  clan  of  Manu,  are  no  doubt  later  than 
the  Brahma?«(as,  but  they  often  contain  old  thoughts. 

These  utterances,  to  which  many  more  might  be 
added,  are  certainly  vague,  and  chaotic,  and  often 
contradictory,  because  they  sprang  from  different 
minds  without  any  prearranged  system  ;  but  tbey 
seem  to  me  to  show  at  all  events  that  thought  and 
language  must  have  occupied  the  philosophers  of 

1   Vod.  Sutras  I,  3,  28. 


MIND    AND    SPEECH.  9! 

India  far  more  than  they  did  the  philosophers  of 
Greece,  and  even  in  later  times  those  of  modern 
Europe.  And  if  some  of  them  assigned  the  first 
place  to  thought  and  others  to  speech,  this  also 
serves  to  show  that  at  all  events  these  early  guessers 
did  not  accept  language  simply  as  a  matter  of 
course,  as  most  of  our  modern  philosophers  are  so 
apt  to  do,  but  tried  hard  to  discover  whence  it  came 
and  what  was  its  true  relation  to  thought.  Thus 
we  read  in  the  /S'atap.  Br.  I,  4,  5,  8  :  'A  dispute  once 
took  place  between  Mind  and  Speech  as  to  which  was 
the  better  of  the  two.  Both  said,  "I  am  excellent." 
Mind  said  :  "  Surely  I  am  better  than  thou,  for  thou 
dost  not  speak  anything  that  is  not  understood  by 
me,  and  since  thou  art  only  an  imitator  of  what 
is  done  by  me  and  a  follower  in  my  wake,  I  am 
surely  better  than  thou."  Speech  said :  "  Surely 
I  am  better  than  thou,  for  what  thou  knowest 
I  make  known,  I  communicate." 

'  They  went  to  appeal  to  Pra^apati  for  his  decision, 
and  Pra</apati  decided  in  favour  of  Mind,  &c.' 

In  the  Anugita  (p.  262)  we  read  on  the  con- 
trary :  '  ihen  the  lord  of  speech  was  produced,  that 
lord  of  speech  looks  up  to  the  mind.  First,  verily, 
are  words  produced,  and  the  mind  runs  after  them.' 

Some  of  the  Brahmanic  thinkers  say  in  so  many 
words  that  Speech  is  Brahman  ($atap.  Br.  II,  i,  4, 
10,  Vag  vai  Brahma),  and  the  co-existence  of  Brthas- 
pati  and  Brahma/zas-pati  could  hardly  have  failed 
to  suggest  to  them  the  identity  of  Brahman  and 
BHh  in  the  sense  of  speech,  just  as  every  thought- 
ful Greek  must  have  known  that  there  was  a  reason 
why  Logos  meant  both  word  and  thought.  But 
that  ancient  chapter  of  thought  which  lies  beyond 


Q2  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  childhood  of  all  philosophy  is  for  ever  lost  to 
us  and  can  be  reconstructed  by  conjectures  only, 
which,  though  they  produce  conviction  in  some 
minds,  cannot  be  expected  to  produce  the  same 
in  all. 

Taking  into  account  all  these  scattered  indica- 
tions, I  cannot  bring  myself  to  accept  the  evolution 
of  the  various  meanings  of  the  word  Brahman  as 
elaborated  by  former  scholars.  I  am  particularly 
reluctant  to  differ  on  such  a  point  from  Professor 
Deussen.  Professor  Deussen  holds  that  Brahman 
had  a  ritualistic  origin  (p.  239),  and  from  prayer 
came  to  mean  he  who  is  prayed  to,  the  Urgrund  der 
Welt,  He  calls  it  der  zum  Heiligen,  Gottlichen 
emporstrebende  Wille  des  Menschen,  which  is  much 
the  same  idea  to  which  Roth  and  others  have 
given  currency,  but  which  certainly  requires  a  fuller 
justification.  Instead  of  beginning  with  the  spe- 
cialised meaning  of  prayer,  whether  ritualistic  or  un- 
premeditated, and  then  rising  to  the  object  of  prayer, 
I  prefer  to  begin  with  Brahman  as  a  synonym  of 
B?vh  in  Br/haspdti,  meaning  word  or  speech,  and  to 
admit  by  the  side  of  it  another  Brahman,  meaning 
that  which  utters  or  drives  forth  (Pra/t-yavayati)  or 
manifests  or  creates,  that  which  is  the  universal 
support  (Skambha)  or  force  (Daksha),  in  fact  the 
Brdhman,  such  as  we  find  it  afterwards,  whether  as 
a  neuter,  Brahman,  or,  for  more  popular  purposes, 
as  a  masculine,  Brahma  \  No  doubt  in  those  dark 
passages  through  which  words  passed  silently  be- 
fore they  emerged  into  the  full  light  of  literature,  we 
may  often  fail  to  discover  the  right  footsteps  of 

1  Tuitt.  Br.  II,  7,  17,  i. 


ATMAN. 


93 


their  progress,  and  we  must  be  prepared  for  differ- 
ences of  opinion.  But  the  really  important  point  is 
that  on  which  all  scholars  agree,  by  assigning  to 
Bnihman  the  final  meaning  of  TO  6V,  TO  6Vro>y  6V, 
rb  TrpcoTov  KLVOVV,  though,  even  of  those  terms,  as 
we  shall  see,  not  one  corresponds  fully  and  exactly 
to  the  character  of  Brahman  as  developed  in  the 
history  of  the  Indian  mind. 

Atman. 

The  next  word  we  have  to  examine  is  Atman. 
It  is  next  in  importance  to  Brahman  only,  and 
the  two  together  may  be  called  the  two  pillars  on 
which  rests  nearly  the  whole  of  the  edifice  of  Indian 
philosophy,  more  particularly  of  the  Vedanta  and 
Samkhya  systems. 

As  early  as  the  time  of  the  Apastamba-S&tras, 
that  is,  at  the  end  of  the  Vedic  period,  we  read,  I,  8, 

23,  i  :— 

'  The  Brahmam  who  is  wise  and  recognises  all 
things  to  be  in  the  Atman,  who  does  not  become 
bewildered  when  pondering  (on  it),  and  who  recog- 
nises the  Atman  in  every  (created)  thing,  he  shines 
indeed  in  heaven  .  .  .' 

And  in  the  same  Sutras,  I,  8,  23,  2,  we  find  a 
definition  of  Brahman,  as  the  cause  of  the  world, 
which  presupposes,  as  clearly  as  possible,  the  preva- 
lence of  Vedantic  ideas  l  at  the  time  of  the  author 
of  this  Sutra  : — 

'  He  who  is  intelligence  itself  and  subtler  than 
the  thread  of  the  lotus-fibre,  He  who  pervades  the 

1  Yoga  and  Mimamsa  also  are  mentioned  by  name  in  the 
Apastamba-Sutras,  bnt  not  yet  as  definite  systems  of  philo- 
sophy. Cf.  I,  8,  23,  5  ;  II,  4,  8,  13. 


94  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

universe  and  who,  unchangeable  and  larger  than  the 
earth,  contains  this  universe  ;  He  who  is  different 
from  the  knowledge  of  this  world  which  is  obtained 
by  the  senses  and  is  identical  with  its  objects,  pos- 
sesses the  highest  (form  of  absolute  knowledge). 
From  him  who  divides  himself,  spring  all  (objective) 
bodies.  He  is  the  primary  cause,  eternal  and  un- 
changeable.' 

The  etymology  of  At  man  is  again  extremely  ob- 
scure, probably  because  it  belongs  to  a  pre-Sanskritic, 
though  Aryan  stratum  of  Indian  speech.  However, 
there  can  be  little  doubt  that  in  the  Veda  Atman, 
in  several  places,  still  means  breath,  as  in  Rv.  X, 
1 6,  3,  su'ryam  MkshuA  ga£Matu,  va'tam  atma,  words 
addressed  to  a  dead  person,  '  May  the  eye  go  to  the 
sun,  the  breath  (Atma)  to  the  wind.'  It  then  came 
to  mean  vital  breath,  life,  and,  like  the  spirit  or 
breath,  was  frequently  used  in  the  sense  of  what 
we  call  soul.  In  some  passages  it  is  difficult  to  say 
whether  we  should  translate  it  by  life  or  by  spirit. 
From  soul  there  is  but  a  small  step  to  Self,  and  that 
step  is  often  grammatical  rather  than  real.  If  in 
the  Atharva-veda  IX,  5,  30  we  read  : — 

Atmanam  pitiiram  put  ram  paiitram  pitamahiim, 
G'ayam  r/iinitrim  miitaram  ye  priyas  tan  upa  hvaye, 

we  have  to  translate  in  English,  '  Myself,  father, 
son,  grandson,  grandfather,  wife,  mother,  whoever 
are  dear, — I  call  upon  them.'  But  Self  may  here  be 
translated  by  soul  or  person  also,  just  as  we  may 
say,  '  My  soul  doth  magnify  the  Lord,'  instead  of 
'I  magnify  the  Lord.'  Again  we  read,  Kv.  IX,  i  13, 
i,  bahim  dddhana/i  atnuini,  'putting  strength  into 
oneself.'  In  the  end  Atman  became  the  regular 


PRA0APATI,  BRAHMAN,  ATMAN.          95 

pronoun  self.  I  need  not  go  through  all  the 
evidence  which  may  be  seen  in  any  Sanskrit  dic- 
tionary1, but  we  have  still  to  see  at  what  stage  in 
its  development  Atman  became  the  definite  name  of 
the  soul  or  Self  within.  This  transition  of  meaning 
in  Atman  offers  a  curious  parallel  to  that  of  As,  in 
Asu  and  Asti,  which  we  examined  before.  There 
are  passages  such  as  Rv.  I,  164,  4,  bhumyaA  asu/< 
asn'k  a'tma  kva  svit,  'Where  was  the  breath,  the 
blood,  the  spirit  of  the  world  ? '  Here  Atm£  may  be 
rendered  by  spirit  or  life.  But  in  other  passages 
Atman  signifies  simply  the  inmost  nature  of  any- 
thing, and  more  particularly  of  man,  so  that  in  the 
end  it  means  much  the  same  as  what  medieval 
philosophers  would  have  called  the  quiddity,  or 
Indian  philosophers  the  Idant&  of  things.  Thus  we 
read  at  first  atmanam  atmana  pasya, '  see  thy  Self  by 
thy  Self;'  atmaiva  hy  atmana/i  sakshi,  'Self  is  the 
witness  of  Self.'  In  this  sense  Atman  is  afterwards 
used  as  the  name  of  the  highest  person,  the  soul 
of  the  world  (Paramatman),  and  we  read  (/S'atap.  Br. 
XIV,  5,5,15)^  sa  va  ayam  atma  sarvesham  bhutanam 
adhipatiA,  sarvesham  bhutanam  rac/a,  'That  Atman  is 
the  sovereign  of  all  beings,  he  is  the  king  of  all 
beings.' 

Pra^apati,  Brahman,  Atman. 

We  have  thus  seen  three  words  growing  up  in 
the  hymns  and  Brahmanas  of  the  Yeda,  Prar/apati, 
Brahman,  and  Atman,  each  of  which  by  itself  repre- 
sents in  nuce  a  whole  philosophy  or  a  view  of  the  world. 

1  See  Anthropological  Keligion,  pp.  200  seq.  ;  Theosophy, 
pp.  247  seq.,  or  more  recentl}-,  Deusseii's  Gescliichte  der 
Philosophic,  pp.  324  seq. 


96  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

In  Pragdpati  we  have  the  admission  of  a  personal 
and  supreme  being,  a  god  above  all  gods,  a  creator 
and  ruler  of  the  world.  He  created  the  primeval 
waters  and  rose  from  them  as  Hiranyagarbha,  in 
order  to  send  forth,  to  animate,  and  to  rule  all 
things.  Whether  this  Pra^rapati  was  himself  the 
material  cause  of  the  world  may  seem  doubtful. 
Many  times  it  is  said  that  he  was  everything  and 
that  he  desired  to  become  many,  and  thus  created 
the  world,  in  which  case  matter  also  \vould  have 
come  out  of  him.  In  other  places,  however,  the 
primeval  waters  seem  to  have  been  admitted  as 
existing  by  themselves  and  apart  from  Prat/apati 
(Rv.  X,  121,  7).  We  also  read  that  in  the  beginning 
there  was  water  over  which  Pra^apati  breathed  as 
wind  and  produced  the  earth,  or  that  the  waters 
themselves  produced  a  golden  egg  from  whence 
arose  Pra^/apati,  the  creator  of  gods  and  men.  There 
occur  even  in  the  Brahmanas  allusions  to  the  legend 
well  known  from  the  Puranas,  that  a  boar  brought 
forth  (Udbabarha  or  Udvavarha  from  V?^h)  the 
earth,  or  that  a  tortoise  supported  it l. 

A  belief  in  that  Pra(/apati,  as  a  personal  god, 
was  the  beginning  of  monotheistic  religion  in  India, 
while  the  recognition  of  Brahman  and  Atman,  as 
one,  constituted  the  foundation  of  all  the  monistic 
philosophy  of  that  country. 


1  M.M.,  India,  pp.  134,  287. 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE    SYSTEMS    OF    PHILOSOPHY. 

Growth  of  Philosophical  Ideas. 

WE  have  thus  learnt  the  important  lesson  that 
all  these  ideas,  metaphysical,  cosmological,  and 
otherwise,  burst  forth  in  India  in  great  profusion 
and  confusion,  and  without  any  preconceived  system. 

We  must  not  suppose  that  these  ideas  follow  each 
other  in  chronological  succession.  Here  once  more 
the  Nebeneinander  gives  us  the  true  key,  much  more 
than  the  Nacheinander.  We  must  remember  that 
this  earliest  philosophy  existed  for  a  long  time 
without  being  fixed  by  writing,  that  there  was 
neither  control,  authority,  nor  public  opinion  to 
protect  it.  Every  Asrama  or  settlement  was  a 
world  by  itself,  even  the  simplest  means  of  com- 
munication, such  as  high-roads  or  rivers,  being  often 
wanting.  The  wonder  is  that,  in  spite  of  all  this, 
we  should  find  so  much  unity  in  the  numerous 
guesses  at  truth  preserved  to  us  among  these 
Vedic  ruins.  This  was  due,  we  are  told,  to  the 
Parampara,  i.e.  to  those  who  handed  down  the 
tradition  and  at  last  collected  whatever  could  be 
saved  of  it.  It  would  be  a  mistake  to  imagine  that 
there  was  a  continuous  development  in  the  various 
meanings  assumed  by  or  assigned  to  such  pregnant 
terms  as  Praf/apati,  Brahman,  or  even  Atman.  It 

H 


98  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

is  much  more  in  accordance  with  what  we  learn 
from  the  Brahmawas  and  Upanishads  of  the  intel- 
lectual life  of  India,  to  admit  an  infinite  number  of 
intellectual  centres  of  thought,  scattered  all  over  the 
country,  in  which  either  the  one  or  the  other  view 
found  influential  advocates.  We  should  then  under- 
stand better  how  Brahman,  while  meaning  what 
bursts  or  drives  forth,  came  to  signify  speech  and 
prayer,  as  well  as  creative  power  and  creator,  and 
why  Atman  meant  not  only  breath,  but  life,  spirit, 
soul,  essence,  or  what  I  have  ventured  to  render  by 
the  Self,  das  Selbst,  of  all  things. 

But  if  in  the  period  of  the  BrahmaTias  and 
Upanishads  we  have  to  find  our  way  through 
religious  and  philosophical  thoughts,  as  through 
clusters  of  thickly  tangled  creepers,  the  outlook 
becomes  brighter  as  soon  as  we  approach  the  next 
period,  which  is  characterised  by  persistent  attempts 
at  clear  and  systematic  thought.  We  must  not 
imagine  that  even  then  we  can  always  discover  in 
the  various  systems  of  philosophy  a  regular  his- 
torical growth.  The  Sutras  or  aphorisms  which  we 
possess  of  the  six  systems  of  philosophy,  each  distinct 
from  the  other,  cannot  possibly  claim  to  represent 
the  very  first  attempts  at  a  systematic  treatment ; 
they  are  rather  the  last  summing  up  of  what  had 
been  growing  up  during  many  generations  of  isolated 
thinkers. 

Prasth&na  Bheda. 

What  the  Brahmans  themselves  thought  of  their 
philosophical  literature  we  may  learn  even  from  such 
modern  treatises  as  the  Prasthana-bheda,  from  which 
I  gave  some  extracts  by  way  of  introduction  to  some 
papers  of  mine  on  one  of  the  systems  of  Indian 


PRASTHANA    BHEDA.  99 

philosophy,  published  as  long  ago  as  1852  in  the 
Journal  of  the  German  Oriental  Society.  It  is  but 
fair  to  state  that  the  credit  of  having  discovered 
that  tract  of  Madhusudana  Sarasvati,  and  perceived 
its  importance,  belonged  really  to  Colebrooke.  I  my- 
self came  to  be  acquainted  with  it  through  my  old 
friend,  Dr.  Trithen,  who  had  prepared  a  critical 
edition  of  it,  but  was  prevented  by  illness  and  death 
from  publishing  it.  It  was  published  in  the  mean- 
time by  Professor  Weber  in  his  Indische  Studien, 
1849,  and  I  think  it  may  be  useful  to  give  once 
more  some  extracts  from  it  ]. 

'Nyaya2,'  he  writes,  'is  logic3,  as  promulgated  by 
Gotama4  in  five  Adhyayas  (lessons).  Its  object  is 
knowledge  of  the  nature  of  the  sixteen  Padarthas  by 
means  of  name,  definition,  and  examination/  These 
Padarthas  are  the  important  or  essential  topics  of  the 
Nyaya  philosophy ;  but  it  has  proved  very  misleading 
to  see  Padartha  here  translated  by  categories.  No  one 
could  understand  why  such  things  as  doubt,  example, 
wrangling,  &c.,  could  possibly  be  called  categories  or 
praedicabilia,  and  it  is  no  wonder  that  Ritter  and 
others  should  have  spoken  of  the  Nyaya  with  open 

1  A  new  translation  of  the  Prasthana-bheda  has  been  pub- 
lished by  Prof.  Deussen  as  an  Introduction  to  his  Allgemeine 
Geschichte  der  Philosophie,  vol.  i,  p.  44,  1894. 

2  Nyaya  is  derived  from  ni  'into, 'and  i  'to  go.'     The  fourth 
member  of  a  syllogism  is  called  Upanaya,  '  leading  towards '  or 
'induction.'     Ballantyne  translates  Nyaya  by  yu,e$o8os. 

3  Anvikshikl  as  an  old  name  of  philosophy,  more  particularly 
of  logic,  occurs  also  in  Gautama's  Dharmasastra  II.  3.     It  is 
used  sometimes  as  synonymous  with  Mimawsa,  and  is  more 
comprehensive  than  logic. 

4  As  the  MSS.  vary  between  Gotama  and  Gautama,  I  have  kept 
the  former  for  the  Nyaya,  'philosopher,'  the  latter  for  Buddha. 

H  2 


100  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

contempt,  as  they  have  done,  if  such  things  were  repre- 
sented to  them  as  the  categories  of  Indian  logic. 

'There  is  also  the  Vaiseshika  philosophy  in  ten 
lessons,  promulgated  by  Kawada.  Its  object  is  to 
establish  by  their  similarities  and  dissimilarities * 
the  six  Padarthas,  viz.  :— 

1.  Dravya,  substance. 

2.  Guwa,  quality. 

3.  Karman,  activity. 

4.  Samanya,  what  is  general  and  found  in  more  than  one 
object.     The  highest  Samanya  is  Satta  or  being. 

5.  Visesha,  the  differentia  or  what  is  special,  residing  in 
eternal  atoms,  &c. 

6.  Samavaya,  inseparable  inherence,  as  between  cause  and 
effect,  parts  and  the  whole,  &c. 

To  which  may  be  added 

7.  Abhava,  negation. 

This  philosophy  also  is  called  Nyaya.' 
These  Padarthas  of  the  Vaiseshikas,  at  least  1-5, 
may  indeed  be  called  categories,  for  they  represent 
what  can  be  predicated,  in  general,  of  the  objects 
of  our  experience,  or,  from  an  Indian  point  of 
view,  what  is  predicated  by,  or  what  is  the  highest 
sense  (Artha)  of  words  (Pada).  Thus  it  has  come  to 
pass  that  Padartha,  literally  the  meaning  of  a  word, 
was  used  in  Sanskrit  in  the  sense  of  things  in 
general,  or  objects.  It  is  rightly  translated  by 
category  when  applied  to  the  five  Padarthas  of 
Ka/tada,  but  such  a  translation,  doubtful  even  in 


1  Bartliolemy  St.  Hilaire,  in  his  work  on  Indian  Logic, 
p.  356,  remarks,  'Mais  le  philosophe  Vaiseshika  n'a  point 
cherche  a  distinguer  les  categories  entre  elles,  en  6mnnerant 
leurs  propriety's,  comine  1'a  fait  le  Stagirite.  II  n'a  point 
montro,  coinme  Aristote,  leurs  rapports  et  leurs  differences.' 
But  this  is  exactly  what  he  has  done,  cf.  Sutras  I,  8  seq. 


PRASTHANA    BHEDA.  IOI 

the  case  of  the  sixth  or  seventh  Padartha  of  the 
Vaiseshikas,  would  of  course  be  quite  misleading 
when  applied  to  the  Padarthas  of  Gotama.  The  real 
categories  would,  in  Gotama's  system,  find  their  place 
mostly  under  Prameya,  meaning  not  so  much  what 
has  to  be  proved  or  established,  as  what  forms  the 
object  of  our  knowledge. 

Madhusudana  continues  :  '  The  Mimamsa  also  is 
twofold,  viz.  the  Karma-Mimawsa  (work-philosophy) 
and  the  $ariraka-Mima???sa  (philosophy  of  the  em- 
bodied spirit).  TheKarma-Mima??isa  has  been  brought 
out  by  the  venerable  (raimini  in  twelve  chapters.' 

The  objects  of  these  twelve  chapters  are  then  indi- 
cated very  shortly,  and  so  as  to  be  hardly  intelligible 
without  a  reference  to  the  original  Sutras.  Dharma, 
the  object  of  this  philosophy,  is  explained  as  con- 
sisting of  acts  of  duty,  chiefly  sacrificial.  The  second, 
third,  and  fourth  chapters  treat1  of  the  differences 
and  varieties  of  Dharma,  its  parts  (or  appendent 
members,  contrasted  with  the  main  act),  and  the 
principal  purpose  of  each  sacrificial  performance.  The 
fifth  chapter  tries  to  settle  the  order  of  all  sacrificial 
performances,  and  the  sixth  the  qualifications  of  its 
performers.  The  subject  of  indirect  precepts  is 
opened  in  the  seventh  chapter  and  carried  on  more 
fully  in  the  eighth.  Inferrible  changes,  adapting  to 
any  variation  or  copy  of  certain  sacrificial  acts  what 
was  designed  for  the  types  or  models  of  them,  are 
discussed  in  the  ninth,  and  bars  or  exceptions  in 
the  tenth.  Concurrent  efficacy  is  considered  in  the 
eleventh  chapter,  and  co-ordinate  effect  in  the  twelfth ; 
that  is,  the  co-operation  of  several  acts  for  a  single 

1  I  give  this  more  intelligible  description  from  Colebrooke, 
Miscellaneous  Essays,  vol.  i,  p.  330  seq. 


102  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

result  is  the  subject  of  the  one,  and  the  incidental  effect 
of  an  act,  of  which  the  chief  purpose  is  different,  is 
discussed  in  the  other l. 

'  There  is  also  the  Samkarsha^a-kcuicZa,  consisting 
of  four  chapters,  composed  by  (raimini,  and  this, 
which  is  known  by  the  name  of  Devata-kanc/a, 
belongs  to  the  Karma-Mima??isa,  because  it  teaches 
the  act  called  Upasana  or  worship. 

'  Next  follows  the  $ariraka-Mima??isa,  consisting 
of  four  chapters.  Its  object  is  to  make  clear  the  one- 
ness of  Brahman  and  Atman  (Self),  and  to  exhibit 
the  rules  which  teach  the  investigation  (of  it)  by 
means  of  Vedic  study,  &c.'  It  is  in  fact  much  more 
what  we  call  a  system  of  philosophy  than  the  Purva- 
Mlmamsa,  and  it  is  quoted  by  different  names,  such 
as  Uttara-Mimamsij  Brahma-Mima/Jisa,  Vedanta,  &c.  - 

'  In  the  first  lecture  is  shown  the  agreement 
with  which  all  Vedanta  passages  refer,  directly 
or  indirectly,  to  the  inward,  undivided,  second-less 
Brahman.  In  the  first  section  are  considered  Vedic 
passages  which  have  clear  indications  of  Brahman  ; 
in  the  second,  passages  which  have  obscure  indica- 
tions of  Brahman,  and  refer  to  Brahman  so  far  as  he 
is  an  object  of  worship;  in  the  third,  passages  which 
have  obscure  indications  of  Brahman,  and  mostly 
refer  to  Brahman,  so  far  as  he  or  it  is  an  object  of 
knowledge.  Thus  the  consideration  of  the  Vedanta 

1  Professor  Deussen  has  given  a,  somewhat  different  version 
of  these  titles.  He  gives,  for  instance,  as  the  subject  of  the 
fiftli  chapter  the  successive  order  of  recitation,  as  enjoined  by 
•S'ruti,  but  to  judge  from  Mini.  Sutras  V,  i,  i,  the  right  meaning 
seems  to  be  the  '  settling  of  the  order  of  performance,  according 
to  .S'ruti,  subject-matter,  recitation,  &c.' 

•  Read  Adya  for  Akhya  in  the  Prasthana  bheda. 


PKASTHANA    BHEDA.  103 

texts  has  been  finished,  and  in  the  fourth  section 
such  words  as  Avyakta,  Agd,  &c.,  are  considered,  of 
which  it  can  be  doubtful  whether  they  may  not  refer 
to  ideas,  adapted  and  formulated  by  the  Samkhya 
philosophers,  such  as  Pradhana,  PrakHti,  which  is 
generally,  though  quite  wrongly,  translated  by  nature, 
as  independent  of  Brahman  or  Purusha. 

'  The  convergence  of  all  Vedanta  texts  on  the 
second-less  Brahman  having  thus  been  established, 
Vyasa  or  Badarayawa,  fearing  an  opposition  by 
means  of  arguments  such  as  have  been  produced 
by  acknowledged  Smntis  and  various  other  systems, 
undertakes  their  refutation,  and  tries  to  establish 
the  incontrovertible  validity  of  his  own  arguments 
in  the  second  lecture.  Here,  in  the  first  section, 
the  objections  to  the  convergence  of  the  Vedanta 
passages  on  Brahman,  as  stated  by  the  Snmtis 
of  the  Samkhya-yoga,  the  Kanadas,  and  by  the 
arguments  employed  by  the  Samkhyas,  are  disposed 
of.  In  the  second  section  is  shown  the  faultiness 
of  the  views  of  the  followers  of  the  Samkhya, 
because  every  examination  should  consist  of  twTo 
parts,  the  establishment  of  our  own  doctrine  and 
the  refutation  of  the  doctrine  of  our  opponents. 
In  the  third  section  the  contradictions  between 
the  passages  of  the  Veda,  referring  to  the  creation 
of  the  elements  and  other  subjects,  are  removed  in 
the  first  part,  and  in  the  second  those  referring  to 
individual  souls.  In  the  fourth  section  are  considered 
all  apparent  contradictions  between  Vedic  passages 
referring  to  the  senses  and  their  objects. 

'  In  the  third  chapter  follows  the  examination  of 
the  means  (of  salvation).  Here  in  the  first  section, 
while  considering  the  going  to  and  returning  from 


104  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

another  world  (transmigration),  dispassionateness 
has  to  be  examined.  In  the  second  section  the 
meaning  of  the  word  Thou  is  made  clear,  and  after- 
wards the  meaning  of  the  word  That.  In  the  third 
section  there  is  a  collection  of  words,  if  not  purely 
tautological,  all  referring  to  the  unqualified  Brahman, 
as  recorded  in  different  $akhas  or  branches  of  the 
Veda  ;  and  at  the  same  time  the  question  is  discussed 
whether  certain  attributes  recorded  by  other  $akhas 
in  teaching  a  qualified  or  unqualified  Brahman,  may 
be  taken  together  or  not.  In  the  fourth  section  the 
means  of  obtaining  a  knowledge  of  the  unqualified 
Brahman,  both  the  external,  such  as  sacrifices  and 
observing  the  four  stations  in  life,  and  the  internal, 
such  as  quietness,  control,  and  meditation,  are  in- 
vestigated. 

'  In  the  fourth  chapter  follows  an  inquiry  into  the 
special  rewards  or  fruits  of  a  knowledge  of  the 
qualified  and  unqualified  Brahman.  In  the  first 
section  is  described  salvation  of  a  man  even  in  this 
life,  when  free  from  the  influence  of  good  or  bad 
acts,  after  he  has  realised  the  unqualified  Brahman 
by  means  of  repeated  study  of  the  Veda,  &c.  In  the 
second  section  the  mode  of  departure  of  a  dying  man 
is  considered.  In  the  third,  the  further  (northern) 
road  of  a  man  who  died  with  a  full  knowledge  of 
the  unqualified  Brahman  is  explained.  In  the  fourth 
section  the  obtainment  of  disembodied  aloneness  by 
a  man  who  knows  the  unqualified  Brahman  is  first 
described,  and  afterwards  the  abode  in  the  world  of 
Brahman,  promised  to  all  who  know  the  qualified 
(or  lower)  Brahman. 

'This,  the  Vedanta,  is  indeed  the  principal  of  all 
doctrines,  any  other  doctrine  is  but  a  complement 


PRASTHANA    BHEDA.  105 

of  it,  and  therefore  it  alone  is  to  be  reverenced  by 
all  who  wish  for  liberation,  and  this  according  to 
the  interpretation  of  the  venerable  $amkara — this 
is  the  secret ! ' 

Here  we  see  clearly  that  Madhusudana  considered 
the  Vedanta-philosophy  as  interpreted  by  Sawikara, 
if  not  as  the  only  true  one,  still  as  the  best  of  all 
philosophies.  He  made  an  important  distinction  also 
between  the  four,  the  Nyaya,  Vaiseshika,  Purva, 
and  Uttara- Mimamsa  on  one  side,  and  the  remain- 
ing two,  the  Samkhya  and  Yoga-philosophies  on 
the  other.  It  is  curious  indeed  that  this  distinction 
has  been  hitherto  so  little  remarked.  According 
to  Madhusudana,  the  philosophies  of  Gotama  and 
Kanada  are  treated  simply  as  Smritis  or  Dharma- 
sastras,  like  the  Laws  of  Manu,  nay  like  the  Mah&- 
bharata  l  of  Vyasa,  and  the  Ramayana  of  Yalmiki. 
Of  course  these  systems  of  philosophy  cannot  be 
called  Smriti  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  Dharmasastra ; 
but,  as  they  are  Snm'ti  or  tradition,  and  not  >Stuti 
or  revelation,  they  may  be  said  to  teach  Dharma,  if 
not  in  the  legal,  at  least  in  the  moral  sense  of  that 
word.  Anyhow  it  is  clear  that  Samkhya  and  Yoga 
were  looked  upon  as  belonging  to  a  class  different 
from  that  to  which  the  two  Mimamsas,  nay  even 
Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika,  and  the  other  recognised 
branches  of  knowledge  belonged,  which  together 
are  represented  as  the  eighteen  branches  of  the 
Trayi  (the  Veda).  Though  it  may  be  difficult  to 
understand  the  exact  reason  of  this  distinction,  the 
distinction  itself  should  not  be  passed  over. 


1  See  Dahlmann,  Das  Mahabharata  als  Epos  und  Eechts- 
buch,  1896. 


106  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

'  The  Samkhya,'  Madhusudana  continues,  '  was 
brought  out  by  the  venerable  Kapila  in  six  Adhyayas. 
In  the  first  Adhyaya  the  objects  for  discussion  are 
considered  ;  in  the  second  the  effects  or  products  of 
Pradhana,  or  original  matter  ;  in  the  third  aloofness 
from  sensuous  objects  ;  in  the  fourth  stories  about 
dispassionate  persons,  such  as  Pingal£  (IV,  1 1),  the 
ttetcher  (IV,  1 8),  &c. ;  in  the  fifth  there  is  refutation 
of  opposite  opinions  ;  in  the  sixth  a  resume  of  the 
whole.  The  chief  object  of  the  Sa??ikhya-philosophy 
is  to  teach  the  difference  between  Praknti  and  the 
Purushas. 

'  Then  follows  the  Yoga-philosophy  as  taught  by 
the  venerable  Pata%yali,  consisting  of  four  parts. 
Here  in  the  first  part  meditation,  which  stops  the 
activity  and  distraction  of  the  mind,  and,  as  a  means 
towards  it,  repeated  practice  and  dispassionateness 
are  discussed  ;  in  the  second  the  eight  accessories 
which  serve  to  produce  deep  meditation  even  in  one 
whose  thoughts  are  distracted,  such  as  (II,  29) 
restraint,  observances,  posture,  regulation  of  breath, 
devotion,  contemplation,  and  meditation  ;  in  the 
third,  the  supernatural  powers  ;  in  the  fourth  alone- 
ness.  The  chief  object  of  this  philosophy  is  to  achieve 
concentration  by  means  of  stopping  all  wandering 
thoughts.' 

After  this  follows  a  short  account  of  the  Pa.supata 
and  Pii/V.'aratra-systems,  and  then  a  recapitulation 
which  is  of  interest.  Here  Madhusudana  says,  'that 
after  the  various  systems  have  been  explained,  it 
should  be  clear  that  there  are  after  all  but  three 
roads. 

i.  The  Arambha-vada,  the  theory  of  atomic 
agglomeration. 


PKASTHANA    BHEDA.  IOJ 

2.  The  Parmama-vada,  the  theory  of  evolution. 
«      13.  The  Vivarta-vada,  the  theory  of  illusion. 

The  first  theory  holds  that  the  four  kinds  of 
atoms  (A.nu),  those  of  earth,  water,  fire,  and  air,  by 
becoming  successively  double  atoms,  &c.,  begin  the 
world  which  culminates  in  the  egg  of  Brahman. 

This  first  theory,  that  of  the  Tarkikas  (Nyaya 
and  Vaiseshika)  and  the  Mimamsakas,  teaches  that 
an  effect  which  was  not  (the  world),  is  produced 
through  the  activity  of  causes  which  are. 

The  second  theory,  that  of  the  Samkhyas,  Yoga- 
patan^alas,  and  Pasupatas,  says  that  Pradhana  alone, 
sometimes  called  Prakriti  or  original  matter,  com- 
posed, as  it  is,  of  the  Gunas  of  Sattva  (good),  llamas 
(moderate),  and  Tamas  (bad),  is  evolved  through 
the  stages  of  Mahat  (perceiving)  and  Ahamkara 
(subjectivity)  into  the  shape  of  the  (subjective  and 
objective)  world.  From  this  point  of  view  the 
effected  world  existed  before  as  real,  though  in  a 
subtile  (invisible)  form,  and  was  rendered  manifest 
through  the  activity  of  a  cause. 

The  third  theory,  that  of  the  BrahmavMins 
(Vedanta),  says  that  the  self-luminous  and  perfectly 
blissful  Brahman  which  has  no  second,  appears  by 
mistake,  through  its  own  power  of  Maya,  as  the 
world,  while  the  Vaishnavas  (Ramanu^a,  &c.)  hold 
that  the  world  is  an  actual  and  true  evolution  of 
Brahman. 

But  in  reality  all  the  Munis  who  have  put 
forward  these  theories  agree  in  wishing  to  prove 
the  existence  of  the  one  Supreme  Lord  without 
a  second,  ending  in  the  theory  of  illusion  (Vivarta). 
These  Munis  cannot  be  in  error,  considering  that 
they  are  omniscient ;  and  these  different  views  have 


I08  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

only  been  propounded  by  them,  in  order  to  keep  off 
all  nihilistic  theories,  and  because  they  were  afraid 
that  human  beings,  with  their  inclinations  towards 
the  objects  of  the  world,  could  not  be  expected  at 
once  to  know  the  true  goal  of  man.  But  all  comes 
right  when  we  understand  that  men,  from  not 
understanding  their  true  object,  imagined  that 
these  Munis  would  have  propounded  what  is  con- 
trary to  the  Veda,  and  thus,  accepting  their  opinions, 
have  become  followers  of  various  paths.' 

Much  of  what  has  here  been  translated  from 
Madhusudana's  Prasthana-bheda,  though  it  gives  a 
general  survey,  is  obscure,  but  will  become  more  in- 
telligible hereafter  when  we  come  to  examine  each  of 
the  six  philosophies  by  itself;  nor  is  it  at  all  certain 
that  his  view  of  the  development  of  Indian  philo- 
sophy is  historically  tenable.  But  it  shows  at  all 
events  a  certain  freedom  of  thought,  which  we  see 
now  and  then  in  other  writers  also,  such  as  Vi<7/iana- 
bhikshu,  who  are  bent  on  showing  that  there  is 
behind  the  diversity  of  Vedanta,  Sa??ikhya,  and 
Nyaya  one  and  the  same  truth,  though  differently 
expressed  ;  that  philosophies,  in  fact,  may  be  many, 
but  truth  is  one. 

But  however  we  may  admire  this  insight  on  the 
part  of  Madhusudana  and  others,  it  is  our  duty,  a>s 
historians  of  philosophy,  to  study  the  different  paths 
by  which  different  philosophers,  whether  by  the 
light  of  revelation  or  by  that  of  their  own  unfettered 
reason,  have  striven  to  discover  the  truth.  It  is  the 
very  multiplicity  and  variety  of  these  paths  that  form 
the  chief  interest  of  the  history  of  philosophy,  and 
the  fact  that  to  the  present  day  these  six  different 
systems  of  philosophy  have  held  their  own  in  the 


PEASTHANA    BHEDA.  109 

midst  of  a  great  multitude  of  philosophic  theories, 
propounded  by  the  thinkers  of  India,  shows  that  we 
must  first  of  all  try  to  appreciate  their  characteristic 
peculiarities,  before  attempting  with  Madhusudana 
to  eliminate  their  distinctive  features. 
These  philosophers  are— 

1.  Badarayawa,  called  also  Vyasa  Dvaipayana  or 
Krishna   Dvaipayana,    the   reputed   author  of  the 
Brahma-Sutras,  called  also  Uttara-Mimamsa-Sutras, 
or  Vyasa-Sutras. 

2.  6raimini,  the   author  of  the  Purva-Mimamsa- 
Sutras. 

3.  Kapila,  the  author  of  the  Samkhya-Sutras. 

4.  Pataw/ali,   also    called  /Stesha   or  Phamn,  the 
author  of  the  Yoga-Sutras. 

5.  Kanada,  also  called  Ka7iabhu<7,  Kanabhakshaka, 
or  UMka,  the  author  of  the  Vaiseshika-Sutras. 

6.  Gotama,  also  called  Akshapada,  the  author  of 
the  Nyaya-Sutras. 

It  is  easy  to  see  that  the  philosophers  to  whom 
our  Sutras  are  ascribed,  cannot  be  considered  as  the 
first  originators  of  Indian  philosophy.  These  Sutras 
often  refer  to  other  philosophers,  who  therefore 
must  have  existed  before  the  time  when  the  Sutras 
received  their  final  form.  Nor  could  the  fact  that 
some  of  the  Sutras  quote  and  refute  the  opinions  of 
other  Sutras,  be  accounted  for  without  admitting 
a  growing  up  of  different  philosophical  schools  side 
by  side  during  a  period  which  preceded  their  last 
arrangement.  Unfortunately  such  references  hardly 
ever  give  us  the  title  of  a  book,  or  its  author,  still 
less  the  ipsissima  verla.  When  they  refer  to  such 
topics  as  Purusha  and  Prakn'ti  we  know  that  they 
refer  to  the  Samkhya,  if  they  speak  of  Arms  or 


110  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

atoms,  we  know  that  their  remarks  are  pointed  at  the 
Vaiseshikas.  But  it  by  no  means  follows  that  they 
refer  to  the  Sawkhya  or  Vaiseshika-Sutras  exactly 
as  we  now  possess  them.  Some  of  these,  as  has  been 
proved,  are  so  modern  that  they  could  not  possibly 
be  quoted  by  ancient  philosophers.  Our  Sawkhya- 
Sutras,  for  instance,  have  been  proved  by  Dr.  F.  Hall 
to  be  not  earlier  than  about  1380  A.  D.,  and  they 
may  be  even  later.  Startling  as  this  discovery 
was,  there  is  certainly  nothing  to  be  said  against 
the  arguments  of  Dr.  Hall  or  against  those  by  which 
Professor  Garbe l  has  supported  Dr.  Hall's  dis- 
covery. In  this  case,  therefore,  these  Sutras  should 
be  looked  upon  as  a  mere  rifaccimento,  to  take 
the  place  of  earlier  Sutras,  which  as  early  as  the 
sixth  cent.  A.  D.  had  probably  been  already  super- 
seded by  the  popular  Sawkhya-karikas  and  then  for- 
gotten. This  late  date  of  our  Sawkhya-Sutras  may 
seem  incredible,  but  though  I  still  hold  that  the 
Sutra-style  arose  in  a  period  when  writing  for 
literary  purposes  was  still  in  its  tentative  stage,  we 
know  that  even  in  our  time  there  are  learned 
Pandits  who  find  no  difficulty  in  imitating  this 
ancient  Sutra-style.  The  Sutra-period,  reaching 
down  as  far  as  Asoka's  reign  in  the  third  century, 
and  his  Council  in  242  B.C.,  claims  not  only  the 
famous  Sutras  of  Pamni,  but  has  also  been  fixed 
upon  as  the  period  of  the  greatest  philosophical 
activity  in  India,  an  activity  called  forth,  it  would 
seem,  by  the  strong  commotion  roused  by  the  rise 
of  the  Buddhist  school  of  philosophy,  and  afterwards 
of  religion. 

'  C«urbo,  Die  Suwkhya- Philosophic,  p.  71. 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS    OF    PHILOSOPHY.  Ill 

Literary  References  in  the  TTpanishads. 
It  is  of  considerable  importance  to  remember  that 
of  the  technical  names  of  the  six  systems  of  phi- 
losophy, two  only  occur  in  the  classical  Upanishads, 
namely  Samkhya  and  Yoga  or  Samkhya-yoga.  Ve- 
danta  does  not  occur,  except  in  the  $vetasvatara, 
Munc/aka  and  some  of  the  later  Upanishads1.  Mi- 
ma?ftsa  occurs  in  the  general  sense  of  investigation, 
Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  are  altogether  absent,  nor 
do  we  meet  with  such  words  as  Hetuvidya,  or 
Anvikshiki,  nor  with  the  names  of  the  reputed 
founders  of  the  six  systems,  except  those  of  the  two 
Mimamsas,  Badarayana  and  6raimini.  The  names 
of  Pata/lr/ali,  or  Ka7^ada,  are  absent  altogether,  while 
the  names  of  Kapila  and  Gotama,  when  they 
occur,  refer,  it  would  seem,  to  quite  different  per- 
sonalities. 

The  Six  Systems  of  Philosophy. 

No  one  can  suppose  that  those  whose  names  are 
mentioned  as  the  authors  of  these  six  philosophical 
systems,  were  more  than  the  final  editors  or  re- 
dactors of  the  Sutras  as  we  now  possess  them.  If 
the  third  century  B.C.  should  seem  too  late  a  date 
for  the  introduction  of  writing  for  literary  purposes 
in  India,  we  should  remember  that  even  inscriptions 
have  not  yet  been  found  more  ancient  than  those 
of  Asoka,  and  there  is  a  wide  difference  between 
inscriptions  and  literary  compositions.  The  Southern 
Buddhists  do  not  claim  to  have  reduced  their 

1  A  curious  distinction  is  made  in  a  commentary  on  the 
Gautama- Sutras  XIX,  12,  where  it  is  said  that  'those  parts  of 
the  Arawyakas  which  are  not  Upanishads  are  called  Vedantas.' 


112  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Sacred  Canon  to  writing  before  the  first  century  B.  c., 
though  it  is  well  known  that  they  kept  up  close 
relations  with  their  Northern  co-religionists  who 
were  acquainted  with  writing1.  During  all  that 
time,  therefore,  between  477  and  77  B.C.,  ever  so 
many  theories  of  the  world,  partaking  of  a  Vedanta, 
Sawkhya  or  Yoga,  nay  even  of  a  Buddhist  cha- 
racter, could  have  sprung  up  and  have  been  reduced 
to  a  mnemonic  form  in  various  Asramas.  We  need 
not  wonder  that  much  of  that  literature,  considering 
that  it  could  be  mnemonic  only,  should  have  been 
irretrievably  lost,  and  we  must  take  care  also  not 
to  look  upon  what  has  been  left  to  us  in  the  old 
Dar^anas,  as  representing  the  whole  outcome  of  the 
philosophical  activity  of  the  whole  of  India  through 
so  many  generations.  All  we  can  say  is  that  phi- 
losophy began  to  ferment  in  India  during  the  period 
tilled  by  Brahmanas  and  Upanishads,  nay  even  in 
some  of  the  Vedic  hymns,  that  the  existence  of 
Upanishads,  though  not  necessarily  our  own,  is 
recognised  in  the  Buddhist  Canon,  and  lastly  that 
the  name  of  Suttas,  as  a  component  part  of  the 
Buddhist  Canon,  must  be  later  than  that  of  the 
earliest  Brahmanic  Sutras,  because  in  the  mean- 
time the  meaning  of  the  word  had  been  changed 
from  short  mnemonic  sentences  to  fully  developed 
discourses.  Possibly  Sutra  was  originally  meant 
for  the  text  to  be  elucidated  in  a  sermon,  so  that 
the  long  Buddhistic  sermons  came  to  be  called 
Suttas  in  consequence. 


1  The  sac  rod  Bo-tree  in  the  city  of  Anuradhapura  in  Ceylon 
was  grown,  we  are  told,  from  a  branch  of  the  tree  at  Buddha 
Gay  a. 


Btf/HASPATI-SUTRAS.  113 

Brihaspati-Stitras. 

That  some  of  the  earlier  philosophical  Sutras  were 
lost,  is  shown  in  the  case  of  the  B?^'haspati-Sutras. 
These  are  said  to  have  contained  the  doctrines  of  the 
out  and  out  materialists,  or  sensualists,  the  Lauka- 
yatikas  or  /farvakas,  who  deny  the  existence  of 
everything  beyond  what  is  given  by  the  senses. 
They  are  referred  to  by  BhaskaraMrya  at  Brahma- 
Sutras  III,  3,  53 \  and  as  he  gives  an  extract,  it  is 
likely  that  they  still  existed  in  his  time,  though 
no  MS.  of  them  has  been  found  as  yet  in  India. 
The  same  applies  to  such  Sutras  as  the  Vaikhanasa- 
Sutras,  possibly  intended  for  the  Vanaprasthas,  and 
the  Bhikshu-Sutras  2,  quoted  by  Panini,  IV,  3,  no, 
and  intended,  it  would  seem,  for  Brahmanic,  and  not 
yet  for  Buddhistic  mendicants.  It  is  a  sad  truth 
which  we  have  to  learn  more  and  more,  that  of 
the  old  pre-Buddhistic  literature  we  have  but  scanty 
fragments,  and  that  even  these  may  be,  in  some 
cases,  mere  reproductions  of  lost  originals,  as  in 
the  case  of  the  Sa?^khya-Sutras.  We  know  now 
that  such  Sutras  could  have  been  produced  at  any 
time,  and  we  should  not  forget  that  even  at  present, 
in  the  general  decay  of  Sanskrit  scholarship,  India 
still  possesses  scholars  who  can  imitate  Kalidasa, 
to  say  nothing  of  such  poems  as  the  Mahabharata 
and  Ramayawa,  and  so  successfully  that  few 
scholars  could  tell  the  difference.  It  is  not  long 
ago  that  I  received  a  Sanskrit  treatise  written  in 
Sutras  with  a  commentary,  the  work  of  a  living 

1  Colebrooke,  Misc.  Essays'2,  I,  429. 

2  They  were  identified  by  Taranatha  TarkavJi/aispati  with  the 
Vedanta-Siitras  ;  see  Siddhanta  Kaumudi,  vol.  i,  p.  592. 

I 


114  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

scholar  in  India,  which  might  have  deceived  many 
a  European  scholar  of  Sanskrit  literature  \  If  that 
is  possible  now,  if,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Kapila- 
Sutras,  it  was  possible  in  the  fourteenth  century, 
why  should  not  the  same  have  taken  place  during 
the  period  of  the  Renaissance  in  India,  nay  even 
at  an  earlier  time  ?  At  all  events,  though  grateful 
for  what  has  been  preserved,  and  preserved  in  what 
may  seem  to  us  an  almost  miraculous  manner,  we 
should  not  imagine  that  we  possess  all,  or  that 
we  possess  what  we  possess  in  its  original  form. 

Books  of  Reference. 

I  shall  mention  here  some  of  the  most  important 
works  only,  from  which  students  of  philosophy, 
particularly  those  ignorant  of  Sanskrit,  may  gain 
by  themselves  a  knowledge  of  the  six  recognised 
svstems  of  Indian  Philosophy.  The  titles  of  the 
more  important  of  the  original  Sanskrit  texts  may 
be  found  in  Colebrooke's  Miscellaneous  Essavs,  vol. 
ii,  p.  259  seq.,  and  in  the  Catalogues,  published 
since  his  time,  of  the  various  collections  of  Sanskrit 
MSS.  in  Europe  and  India. 

For  the  Vedanta-philosophy  of  Badarayawa  the 
most  useful  book  is  Thibaut's  English  translation  of 

the  text  of  the  Sutras  and  /Sa?«kara's  commentary  in 

j 

the  S.  B.  E. ,  vols.  xxxiv  and  xxxviii. 

Of  books  written  in  German,  Deussen's  translation 
of  the  same  work,  1887,  preceded  as  it  was  by  his 


'  It  is  called  Katantra/,7,7mnda//prakriva  by  -A'andrakanta 
Tarkalarikara,  1896,  and  gives  additional  Sutras  to  the  Ka- 
tantra  on  Vedic  Grammar.  He  makes  no  secret  that  Sutraw 
vrittis  /robhayam  api  mayaiva  vyaraA'i,  'the  Sutra  and  the 
commentary,  both  were  composed  by  me.' 


BOOKS    OF    REFERENCE.  115 

'System    des    Vedanta/    1883,    can    be   thoroughly 
recommended. 

Of  the  Samkhya-system  we  have  the  Sutras  trans- 
lated by  Ballantyne  in  1882-1885,  the  Aphorisms 
of  the  Samkhya  Philosophy  of  Kapila,  with  illustra- 
tive extracts  from  the  Commentaries,  1852,  1865, 
1885. 

In  German  we  have  the  Samkhya-Prava&ana- 
Bhashya,  Vigwana-bhikshu's  Commentar  zu  den 
Samkhya-Sutras,  iibersetzt  von  K.  Garbe,  1889. 
Also  Aniruddha's  Commentary  and  the  original 
parts  of  Vedcantin  Mahadeva's  commentary  on  the 
Samkhya-Sutras,  by  Richard  Garbe,  1892. 

Der  Mondschein  der  Samkhya  Wahrheit,  Va&a- 
spatimis'ra's  Sa7?ikhya-tattva-kaumudi,  iibersetzt  von ' 
II.  Garbe,  1892,  is  also  a  very  useful  work. 

The  Samkhya  Karika  by  Iswarakrishna,  translated 
from  the  Sanscrit  by  H.  T.  Colebrooke,  also  the 
Bhashya  or  commentary  by  Gaurapada ;  translated 
and  illustrated  by  an  original  comment  by  H.  H. 
Wilson,  Oxford,  1837,  may  still  be  consulted  with 
advantage. 

Other  useful  w^orks  are  :— 

John  Davies,  Hindu  Philosophy.      The   Sankhya  . 
Karika  of  Iswarakrishna,  London,  1881. 

Die  Samkhya-Philosophie,  nach  den  Quellen,  von 
H.  Garbe,  1894. 

Of  the  Purva-Mimamsa  or  simply  Mimamsa,  which 
deals  chiefly  with  the  nature  and  authority  of  the 
Veda  with  special  reference  to  sacrificial  and  other 
duties,  we  have  the  Sutras  with  $abarasvamin's 
commentary  published  in  the  original ;  but  there  is 
as  yet  no  book  in  English  in  which  that  system  may 
be  studied,  except  Professor  Thibaut's  translation  of 

I  2 


Il6  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Laugakshi  Bhaskara's  Arthasawgraha,  a  short  ab- 
stract of  that  philosophy,  published  in  the  Benares 
Sanskrit  Series,  No.  4. 

The  Vaiseshika  system  of  philosophy  may  be 
studied  in  an  English  translation  of  its  Sutras  by 
A.  E.  Gough,  Benares,  1873  ;  also  in  a  Gertnan  trans- 
lation by  Roer,  Zeitschrift  der  Deutschen  Morgen- 
liindischen  Gesellschaft,  vols.  21  and  22,  and  in  some 
articles  of  mine  in  the  same  Journal  of  the  German 
Oriental  Society,  1849. 

The  Nyaya-Sutras  of  Gotama  have  been  translated, 
with  the  exception  of  the  last  book,  by  Ballantyne, 
Allahabad,  1850-57. 

The  Yoga-Sutras  are  accessible  in  an  English 
translation  by  Rajendraldla  Mitra,  in  the  Bibliotheca 
Indica,  Nos.  462,  478,  482,  491,  and  492. 

Dates  of  the  Philosophical  Sfttras. 
If  we  consider  the  state  of  philosophical  thought 
in  India  such  as  it  is  represented  to  us  in  the 
Brahma^as  and  Upanishads,  and  afterwards  in  the 
canonical  books  of  the  Buddhists,  we  cannot  wonder 
that  all  attempts  at  fixing  the  dates  of  the  six 
recognised  systems  of  philosophy,  nay  even  their 
mutual  relationship,  should  hitherto  have  failed.  It 
is  true  that  Buddhism  and  (-rainism  were  likewise 
but  two  philosophical  systems  out  of  many,  and  that 
it  has  been  possible  to  fix  their  dates.  But  if  in 
their  case  we  know  something  about  their  dates  and 

O 

their  historical  development,  this  is  chiefly  due  to  the 
social  and  political  importance  which  they  acquired 
during  the  fifth,  the  fourth,  and  the  third  centuries 
B.C.,  and  not  simply  to  their  philosophical  tenets. 
We  know  also  that  there  were  many  teachers,  con- 


DATES    OF    THE    PHILOSOPHICAL    SUTRAS.  117 

temporaries  of  Buddha,  but  they  have  left  no  traces 
in  the  literary  history  of  India. 

Nor  should  we  forget  that,  though  the  date  of  the 
Buddhist  Canon  may  be  fixed,  the  date  of  many  of 
the  texts  which  we  now  possess  and  accept  as 
canonical  is  by  no  means  beyond  the  reach  of  doubt. 

In  the  Buddhist  annals  themselves  other  teachers 
such  as  6rfiatiputra,  the  Nirgrantha,  the  founder  of 
6rainism,  Purana  Kasyapa,  Kakuda  Katyayana, 
Agita  Kesakambali,  Sam^aya  Vaira^i-putra,  Gosali- 
putra,  the  Maskarin,  are  mentioned  by  the  side  of 
Gautama,  the  prince  of  the  clan  of  the  Sakyas.  One 
of  these  only  became  known  in  history,  6r7iatiputra, 
the  Nirgrantha  or  gymnosophist,  because  the  society 
founded  by  him,  like  the  brotherhood  founded  by 
Buddha,  developed  into  a  powerful  sect,  the  (rainas. 
Another,  Gosali  with  the  bamboo  stick,  originally 
an  A^ivaka,  then  a  follower  of  Mahavira,  became 
likewise  the  founder  of  a  sect  of  his  own,  which, 
however,  has  now  disappeared l.  6r/mtiputra  or 
Nataputta  was  actually  the  senior  of  Buddha. 

Though  it  seems  likely  that  the  founders  of  the 
six  systems  of  philosophy,  though  not  the  authors  of 
the  Sutras  which  we  possess,  belonged  to  the  same 
period  of  philosophical  and  religious  fermentation 
which  gave  rise  to  the  first  spreading  of  Buddha's 
doctrines  in  India,  it  is  by  no  means  clear  that  any 
of  these  systems,  in  their  literary  form,  are  pre- 
supposed by  Buddhism.  This  is  owing  to  the  vague- 
ness of  the  quotations  which  are  hardly  ever  given 
verbatim.  In  India,  during  the  mnemonic  period  of 
literature,  the  contents  of  a  book  may  have  become 


1  Kern,  Bucldhismus,  I,  p.  182. 


Il8  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

considerably  modified,  while  the  title  remained  the 
same.  Even  at  a  much  later  time,  when  we  see 
Bharb'/hari  (died  650  A.  D.)  referring  to  the  Mima?/i- 
saka,  Sawkhya,  and  Vaiseshika  Darsanas,  we  have 
no  right  to  conclude  that  he  knew  these  Darsanas 
exactly  as  we  know  them,  though  he  may  well  have 
known  these  philosophies  after  they  had  assumed 
their  systematic  form.  Again,  when  he  quotes 
Naiyayikas,  it  by  no  means  follows  that  he  knew 
our  Gotama-Sutras,  nor  have  we  any  right  to  say 
that  our  Gotama-Sutras  existed  in  his  time.  It 
is  .possible,  it  is  probable,  but  it  is  not  certain. 
We  must  therefore  be  very  careful  not  to  rely  too 
much  on  quotations  from,  or  rather  allusions  to, 
other  systems  of  philosophy. 

Sawzkhya-Stltras. 

The  Sa??ikhya-Sutras,  as  we  possess  them,  are  very 
chary  of  references.  They  clearly  refer  to  Vaiseshika 
and  Nyaya,  when  they  examine  the  six  categories 
of  the  former  (V,  85)  and  the  sixteen  Padarthas  of 
the  latter  (V,  86).  Whenever  they  refer  to  the  Anus 
or  atoms,  we  know  that  they  have  the  Vai.veshika- 
philosophy  in  their  minds  ;  and  once  the  Vaiseshikas 
are  actually  mentioned  by  name  (I,  25).  /SYuti,  which 
the  Sa?/<khyas  were  supposed  to  disregard,  is  very 
frequently  appealed  to,  Sm/'/ti  once  (V,  123),  and  Va- 
madeva,  whose  name  occurs  in  both  iSVuti  and  Snm'ti, 
is  mentioned  as  one  who  had  obtained  spiritual 
freedom.  But  of  individual  philosophers  we  meet 
only  with  Sanandana  A/.-firya  (VI,  69)  andPawX.-a.vikha 
(V,  32;  VI,  68),  while  the  teachers,  the  A&aryas, 
when  mentioned  in  general,  are  explained  as  com- 
prehending Kapila  himself,  as  well  as  others. 


VEDANTA-SUTRAS.  1 19 

Vedanta-Stltras. 

The  Vedanta-Sutras  contain  more  frequent  refer- 
ences, but  they  too  do  not  help  us  much  for  chrono- 
logical purposes. 

Badarayana   refers   more   or   less   clearly  to   the 
Buddhists,  the  6rainas,  Pasupatas,  and  Pa/iAaratras, 
all  of  whom  he  is  endeavouring  to  refute.    He  never 
refers,  however,  to  any  literary  work,  and  even  when 
he  refers  to  other  philosophical  systems,  he  seems  to 
avoid  almost  intentionally  the  recognised  names  of 
their  authors,  nay  even  their  technical  terms.     Still 
it  is  clear  that  the  systems  of  the  Purva-Mlmamsa, 
the  Yoga,  Samkhya,  and  Vaiseshika  were  in  his  mind 
when  he  composed  his  Sutras,  and  among  Mimamsic 
authorities  he  refers  by  name  to   (raimini,  Badari, 
Audfalomi,  Asmarathya,   Kasakn/tsna,   Karslmagdni, 
and  Atreya,  nay  to  a  Badaraya>ia  also.    We  cannot  be 
far  wrong  therefore  if  we  assign  the  gradual  forma- 
tion of  the  six  systems  of  philosophy  to  the  period 
from  Buddha  (fifth  century)  to  Asoka  (third  century), 
though  we  have  to  admit,  particularly  in  the  cases 
of  Vedaiita,  Samkhya,   and  Yoga   a  long  previous 
development    reaching    back   through    Upanishads 
and  BrahmaTias  to  the  very  hymns  of  the  Kig-veda. 
It  is  equally  difficult  to  fix  the  relative  position  *- 
of  the   great    systems    of  philosophy,    because,    as 
I  explained  before,  they  quote  each  other  mutually. 
With  regard  to  the  relation  of  Buddhism  to  the  six 
orthodox  systems  it  seems  to   me  that  all  we  can 
honestly  say  is  that  schools  of  philosophy  handing 
down    doctrines   very   similar    to    those  of  our   six 
classical   or    orthodox  systems,  are  presupposed  by 

1  Bhandarkar,  Samkhya  Philosophy  (1871),  p.  3. 


120  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  Buddhist  Suttas.  But  this  is  very  different  from 
the  opinion  held  by  certain  scholars  that  Buddha 
or  his  disciples  actually  borrowed  from  our  Sutras. 
We  know  nothing  of  Samkhya-literature  before  the 
Sca??ikhya-karikas,  which  belong  to  the  sixth  century 
after  Christ.  Even  if  we  admit  that  the  Tattva- 
samasa  was  an  earlier  work,  how  could  we,  without 
parallel  dates,  prove  any  actual  borrowing  on  the 
part  of  Buddha  or  his  disciples  at  that  early  time  ? 

In  the  Upanishads  and  Brahma?? as,  though  there 
is  a  common  note  running  through  them  all,  there 
is  as  yet  great  latitude  and  want  of  system,  and 
a  variety  of  opinions  supported  by  different  teachers 
and  different  schools.  Even  in  the  hymns  we  meet 
with  great  independence  and  individuality  of  thought, 
which  occasionally  seems  to  amount*  to  downright 
scepticism  and  atheism. 

We  must  keep  all  this  in  mind  if  we  wish  to  gain 
a  correct  idea  of  the  historical  origin  and  growth  of 
what  we  are  accustomed  to  call  the  six  philosophical 
systems  of  India.  We  have  seen  already  that  philo- 
sophical discussions  were  not  confined  to  the  Brah- 
mans,  but  that  the  Kshatriyas  also  took  a  very  active 
and  prominent  part  in  the  elaboration  of  such  funda- 
mental philosophical  concepts  as  that  of  Atman  or 
Self. 

It  is  out  of  this  floating  mass  of  philosophical 
and  religious  opinion,  which  was  common  property 
in  India,  that  the  regular  systems  slowly  emerged. 
Though  we  do  not  know  in  what  form  this  took 
place,  it  is  quite  clear  that  what  we  now  possess  of 
philosophical  manuals,  in  the  form  of  Sutras,  could 
not  have  been  written  down  during  the  time  when 
writing  for  any  practical  purposes  except  inscrip- 


MNEMONIC    LITERATURE.  121 

tions  on  monuments  and  coins  was  still  unknown  in 
India,  or  at  all  events  had  not  yet  been  employed 
for  literary  purposes,  so  far  as  we  know. 

Mnemonic  Literature. 

It  has  now  been  generally  admitted,  I  believe, 
that  whenever  writing  has  once  become  popular, 
it  is  next  to  impossible  that  there  should  be  no 
allusion  to  it  in  the  poetical  or  prose  compositions  of 
the  people.  Even  as  late  as  the  time  of  $amkara, 
the  written  letters  are  still  called  unreal  (AnHta)  in 
comparison  with  the  audible  sounds,  as  classified  in 
the  Pratisakhyas,  which  are  represented  by  them 
(Ved.  Sutras  II,  I,  14,  p.  451).  There  is  no  allusion 
to  writing  in  the  hymns,  the  Brahmanas  and  Upani- 
shads  ;  very  few,  if  any,  in  the  Sutras.  The  historical 
value  of  these  allusions  to  writing  which  occur  in  the 
literature  of  the  Buddhists  depends,  of  course,  on 
the  date  which  we  can  assign,  not  to  the  original 
authors,  but  to  the  writers  of  our  texts.  We  must 
never  forget  that  there  was  in  India  during  many 
centuries  a  purely  mnemonic  literature,  which  con- 
tinued down  to  the  Sutra-period,  and  which  was 
handed  down  from  generation  to  generation  accord- 
ing to  a  system  which  is  fully  described  in  the 
Pratisakhyas.  What  would  have  been  the  use  of 
that  elaborate  system,  if  there  had  been  manuscripts 
in  existence  at  the  same  time  ? 

When  that  mnemonic  literature,  that  Smr/ti, 
came  for  the  first  time  to  be  reduced  to  writing, 
this  probably  took  place  in  something  like  the  form 
of  Sutras.  The  very  helplessness  of  the  Sutra-style 
would  thus  become  intelligible.  Letters  at  that 
time  were  as  yet  monumental  only,  for  in  India  also 


122  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

monumental  writing  is  anterior  to  literary  writing, 
and  to  the  adoption  of  a  cursive  alphabet.  Writing 
material  was  scarce  in  India,  and  the  number  of 
those  who  could  read  must  have  been  very  small. 
At  the  same  time  there  existed  the  old  mnemonic 
literature,  invested  with  a  kind  of  sacred  character, 
part  and  parcel  of  the  ancient  system  of  education, 
which  had  so  far  answered  all  purposes  and  was  not 
easy  to  supplant.  Much  of  that  mnemonic  literature 
has  naturally  been  lost,  unless  it  was  reduced  to 
writing  at  the  proper  time.  Often  the  name  may 
have  survived,  while  the  body  of  a  work  was  en- 
tirely changed.  Hence  when  we  see  the  Sa?nkhya 
mentioned  by  name  in  the  Buddhist  texts,  such  as 
the  Visuddhi-magga  (chap.  XVII),  it  is  impossible  to 
tell  whether  even  at  that  time  there  existed  a  work 
on  the  Sawkhya-philosophy  in  the  form  of  Sutras. 
It  is  clear  at  all  events  that  it  could  not  have  been 
our  Sa//<khya-Sutras,  nor  even  the  Samkhya-karikas 
which  seem  to  have  superseded  the  ancient  Sutras 
early  in  the  sixth  century,  while  our  present  Sutras 
date  from  the  fourteenth. 

It  might  be  possible,  if  not  to  prove,  at  all  events 
to  render  probable  the  position  assigned  here  to 
Buddha's  teaching  as  subsequent  to  the  early  growth 
of  philosophical  ideas  in  their  systematic  and  more 
or  less  technical  form,  by  a  reference  to  the  name 
assigned  to  his  mother,  whether  it  was  her  real 
name  or  a  name  assigned  to  her  by  tradition.  She 
was  called  Maya  or  Mayadevi.  Considering  that  in 
Buddha's  eyes  the  world  was  Maya  or  illusion,  it 
seems  more  likely  that  the  name  was  given  to  his 
mother  by  early  tradition,  and  that  it  was  given 
not  without  a  purpose.  And  if  so  this  could  only 


THE    BB7HASPATI-PHILOSOPHY.  123 

have  been  after  the  name  of  Avidya  (nescience)  in 
the  Vedanta,  and  of  PrakHti  in  the  Samkhya-philo- 
sophy  had  been  replaced  by  the  technical  term  of 
Maya.  It  is  well  known  that,  in  the  old  classical 
Upanishads,  the  name  of  May&  never  occurs ;  and  it 
is  equally  significant  that  it  does  occur  in  the  later 
and  more  or  less  apocryphal  Upanishads.  In  the 
/SVetasvatara,  for  instance,  I,  10,  we  read,  Maya?)i  tu 
Prakntim  vidyat,  '  Let  him  know  that  Prakrit i  is 
Maya  or  May4  PrakHt i.'  This  refers,  it  would  seem, 
to  the  Samkhya  system  in  which  Prakriti  acts  the 
part  of  Maya  and  fascinates  the  Purusha,  till  he 
turns  away  from  her  and  she  ceases  to  exist,  at  all 
events  as  far  as  he  is  concerned.  But  whether  in 
Samkhya  or  Vedanta,  Maya  in  its  technical  meaning 
belongs  certainly  to  a  secondary  period,  and  it  might 
therefore  be  argued  that  May&,  as  the  name  of 
Buddha's  mother,  is  not  likely  to  have  found  a  place 
in  the  Buddhistic  legend  during  the  early  period 
of  Indian  philosophy,  as  represented  in  the  early 
Upanishads,  and  even  in  the  Sutras  of  these  two 
prominent  schools. 

There  was,  no  doubt,  a  certain  amount  of  philo- 
sophical mnemonic  composition  after  the  period 
represented  by  the  old  Upanishads,  and  before  the 
systematic  arrangement  of  the  philosophical  Sutras, 
but  whatever  may  have  existed  in  it,  is  for  ever  lost 
to  us.  We  can  see  this  clearly  in  the  case  of  the 
Bn'haspati-philosophy. 

The  Bnhaspati-Philosophy. 

Brihaspati  is  no  doubt  a  very  perplexing  character. 
His  name  is  given  as  that  of  the  author  of  two  Vedic 
hymns,  X,  71,  X,  72,  a  distinction  being  made 


124  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

between  a  Bn'haspati  Angirasa  and  a  Brihaspati 
Laukya  (Laukayatika  ?).  His  name  is  well  known 
also  as  one  of  the  Vedic  deities.  In  Rv.  VIII,  96, 
15,  we  read  that  Indra,  with  B?*?'haspati  as  his  ally, 
overcame  the  godless  people  (adevi/i  vis&h).  He  is 
afterwards  quoted  as  the  author  of  a  law-book, 
decidedly  modern,  which  we  still  possess.  B?^'has- 
pati  is  besides  the  name  of  the  planet  Jupiter,  and 
of  the  preceptor  or  Purohita  of  the  gods,  so  that 
Brihaspati-purohita  has  become  a  recognised  name 
of  Indra,  as  having  BHhaspati  for  his  Purohita  or 
chief  priest  and  helper.  It  seems  strange,  therefore, 
that  the  same  name,  that  of  the  preceptor  of  the 
gods,  should  have  been  chosen  as  the  name  of  the 
representative  of  the  most  unorthodox,  atheistical, 
and  sensualistic  system  of  philosophy  in  India. 
We  may  possibly  account  for  this  by  referring  to 
the  Brahma?ias  and  Upanishads,  in  which  Bn'has- 
pati  is  represented  as  teaching  the  demons  his 
pernicious  doctrines,  not  for  their  benefit,  but  for 
their  own  destruction.  Thus  we  read,  Maitrdyami 
Up.  7,  9  :— 

'  Bn'haspati,  having  become  or  having  assumed 
the  shape  of  £ukra,  brought  forth  that  false  know- 
ledge, for  the  safety  of  Indra  and  for  the  destruction 
of  the  Asuras  (demons).  By  it  they  show  that 
good  is  evil  and  that  evil  is  good,  and  they  say 
that  this  new  law,  which  upsets  the  Veda  and  the 
other  sacred  books,  should  be  studied  (by  the 
Asuras,  the  demons).  That  being  so,  it  is  said, 
Let  no  man  (but  the  demons  only)  study  that  false 
knowledge,  for  it  is  wrong  ;  it  is,  as  it  were,  barren. 
Its  reward  lasts  only  as  long  ;>s  the  pleasure  lasts, 
as  with  one  who  has  fallen  from  his  station  (caste). 


THE    B#/  HASP  ATI-PHILOSOPHY.  125 

Let  that  false  doctrine  not  be  attempted,  for  thus 
it  is  said 1 : — 

1.  Widely  divergent  and  opposed  are  these  two, 
the  one  known  as  false  knowledge,   the    other   as 
knowledge.      I    (Yama)    believe    Na&iketas    to    be 
possessed  of  a   desire  for  knowledge  ;    even  many 
pleasures  do  not  tempt  him  away. 

2.  He   who   knows  at   the   same  time  both   the 
imperfect    knowledge    (of  ritual)    and    the    perfect 
knowledge  (of  Self),  crosses  death  by  means  of  the 
imperfect,  and  obtains  immortality  by  means  of  the 
perfect  knowledge  2. 

3.  Those  who  are  wrapt  up  in  imperfect  know- 
ledge  fancy   themselves    alone    wise    and   learned, 
they  wander  about  floundering  and  deceived,  like 
the  blind  led  by  a  man  who  is  himself  blind  V 

And  again  : — 

'  The  gods  and  the  demons,  wishing  to  know 
the  Self,  went  once  into  the  presence  of  Brahman 
(their  father  Pra^apati4).  Having  bowed  before 
him,  they  said  :  "0  blessed  one,  we  wish  to  know 
the  Self,  do  thou  tell  us  ! "  Thus,  after  considering, 
he  thought,  these  demons  believe  in  a  difference  of 
the  Atman  (from  themselves),  and  therefore  a  very 
different  Self  was  taught  to  them.  On  that  Self 
these  deluded  demons  take  their  stand,  clinging 
to  it,  destroying  the  true  boat  of  salvation,  and 
praising  untruth.  What  is  untrue  they  see  as 
true,  like  jugglery.  But  in  reality,  what  is  said 
in  the  Vedas,  that  is  true.  What  is  said  in  the 
Vedas,  on  that  the  wise  take  their  stand.  There- 


Kai£/?a  Upanishad  II,  4.  :  Va#.  Up.  II. 

KaM.  Up.  II,  5.  4  A7;and.  Up.  VIII,  8. 


126  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

fore  let  no  Brahman  study  what  is  not  in  the 
Vedas,  or  this  will  be  the  result  (as  in  the  case 
of  the  demons).' 

This  passage  is  curious  in  several  respects.  First 
of  all  it  is  a  clear  reference  of  one  Upanishad  to 
another,  namely  to  the  ./TMndogya,  in  which  this 
episode  of  Bn'haspati  giving  false  instruction  to 
the  demons  is  more  fully  detailed.  Secondly  wre 
see  an  alteration  which  was  evidently  made  in- 
tentionally. In  the  A'Mndogya  Upanishad  it  is 
Pra^tipati  himself  who  imparts  false  knowledge  of 
the  Atman  to  the  Asuras,  while  in  the  Maitrayana 
Upanishad  Bn'haspati  takes  his  place.  It  is  not 
unlikely  that  Brihaspati  was  introduced  in  the  later 
Upanishad  in  order  to  take  the  place  of  Pra^apati, 
because  it  wras  felt  to  be  wrong  that  this  highest 
deity  should  ever  have  misled  anybody,  even  the 
demons.  In  the  A7mndogya  the  demons  who  be- 
lieved in  the  Anyata  (otherness)  of  the  Atman,  that 
is  to  sav,  in  the  possibility  that  the  Atman  could 

i/  «/ 

be  in  some  place  different  from  themselves,  were 
told  to  look  for  it  in  the  person  seen  in  the  pupil 
of  the  eye,  or  in  the  image  in  a  looking-glass,  or 
in  the  shadow  in  the  water.  All  this  would,  how- 
ever, refer  to  a  visible  body  only.  Then  Prar/apati 
goes  on  to  say  that  the  Atman  is  what  moves 
about  full  of  pleasures  in  a  dream,  and  as  this 
would  still  be  the  individual  man,  he  declares  at 
last  that  Atman  is  what  remains  in  deep  sleep, 
without  however  losing  its  own  identity. 

If  thon  in  the  Upanishads  already  Bn'haspati  was 
introduced  for  the  purpose  of  teaching  wrong  and 
unorthodox  opinions,  we  may  possibly  be  able  to  under- 
stand how  his  name  came  to  cling  to  sensualistic 


THE    Bfl/HASPATI-PHILOSOPHY.  127 

opinions,  and  how  at  last,  however  unfairly,  he  was 
held  responsible  for  them.  That  such  opinions 
existed  even  at  an  earlier  time,  we  can  see  in 
some  of  the  hymns  in  which  many  years  ago  I 
pointed  out  these  curious  traces  of  an  incipient 
scepticism.  In  later  Sanskrit,  a  Barhaspatya,  or  a 
follower  of  BHhaspati,  has  come  to  mean  an  infidel 
in  general.  Among  the  works  mentioned  in  the 
Lalita-vistara  as  studied  by  Buddha  a  Barhas- 
patyam  is  mentioned,  but  whether  composed  in 
Sutras  or  in  metre  does  not  appear.  Besides,  it 
is  well  known  that  the  Lalita-vistara  is  rather  a 
broken  reed  to  rest  upon  for  chronological  purposes. 
If  we  may  trust,  however,  to  a  scholion  of  Bhas- 
kara  on  the  Brahma-Sutras,  he  seems  to  have  known, 
even  at  that  late  time,  some  Sutras  ascribed  to 
BHhaspati1,  in  which  the  doctrines  of  the  ^arvakas 
i.  e.  unbelievers,  were  contained.  But  although  such 
Sutras  may  have  existed,  we  have  no  means  of 
fixing  their  date  as  either  anterior  or  posterior  to 
the  other  philosophic  Sutras.  Pamni  knew  of  Sutras 
which  are  lost  to  us,  and  some  of  them  may  be 
safely  referred  to  the  time  of  Buddha.  He  also 
in  quoting  Bhikshu-Sutras  and  Na^a-Sutras,  men- 
tions (IV,  3,  no)  the  author  of  the  former  as 
Parasarya,  of  the  latter  as  /Silalin.  As  Parasarya 
is  a  name  of  Vyasa,  the  son  of  Parasara,  it  has  been 
supposed  that  Pamni  meant  by  Bhikshu- Sutras,  the 
Brahma  -  Sutras  L',  sometimes  ascribed  to  Vyasa, 
which  we  still  possess.  That  would  fix  their  date 
about  the  fifth  century  B.C.,  and  has  been  readily 
accepted  therefore  by  all  who  wish  to  claim  the 

1  Colebrooke,  II.  429.  z  See  before,  p.  113. 


128  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

greatest  possible  antiquity  for  the  philosophical 
literature  of  India.  But  Parasarya  would  hardly 
have  been  chosen  as  the  titular  name  of  Vyasa  ;  and 
though  we  should  not  hesitate  to  assign  to  the 
doctrines  of  the  Vedanta  a  place  in  the  fifth  century 
B.C.,  nay  even  earlier,  we  cannot  on  such  slender 
authority  do  the  same  for  the  Sutras  themselves. 

When  we  meet  elsewhere  wTith  the  heterodox 
doctrines  of  Bri'haspati,  they  are  expressed  in  verse, 
as  if  taken  from  a  Karika  rather  than  from  Sutras. 
They  possess  a  peculiar  interest  to  us,  because  they 
would  show  us  that  India,  which  is  generally  con- 
sidered as  the  home  of  all  that  is  most  spiritual 
and  idealistic,  was  by  no  means  devoid  of  sensual- 
istic  philosophers.  But  though  it  is  difficult  to  say 
how  old  such  theories  may  have  been  in  India  it 
is  certain  that,  as  soon  as  we  get  any  coherent 
treatises  on  philosophy,  sensualistic  opinions  crop 
up  among  them. 

Of  course  the  doctrines  of  Buddha  would  be  called 
sceptical  and  atheistic  by  the  Brahmans,  and  /iar- 
vaka  as  well  as  Nastika  are  names  freely  applied 
to  the  Buddhists.  But  the  doctrines  of  Brihaspati, 
as  far  as  we  know  them,  go  far  beyond  Buddhism, 
and  mav  be  said  to  be  hostile  to  all  religious  feel- 

»/  O 

ings,  while  Buddha's  teaching  was  both  religious 
and  philosophical,  though  the  lines  that  separate 
philosophy  and  religion  in  India  are  very  faint. 

There  are  some  tenets  of  the  followers  of  Bn'has- 
pati  which  seem  to  indicate  the  existence  of  other 
schools  of  philosophy  by  their  side.  The  Barhas- 
patyas  speak  as  if  being  inter  jxtrcs,  they  differ  from 
others  as  others  differed  from  them.  Traces  of  an 
opposition  against  the  religion  of  the  Vedas  (Kautsa) 


THE    B.K/HASP ATI-PHILOSOPHY.  129 

appear  in  the  hymns,  the  Brahmaftas,  and  the 
Sutras,  and  to  ignore  them  would  give  us  an  entirely 
false  idea  of  the  religious  and  philosophical  battles 
and  battle-fields  of  ancient  India.  As  viewed  from 
a  Brahmanic  point  of  view,  and  we  have  no  other, 
the  opposition  represented  by  Bn'haspati  and  others 
may  seem  insignificant,  but  the  very  name  given 
to  these  heretics  would  seem  to  imply  that  their 
doctrines  had  met  with  a  world-wide  acceptance 
(Lokayatikas).  Another  name,  that  of  Nastika, 
is  given  to  them  as  saying  No  to  everything  ex- 
cept the  evidence  of  the  senses,  particularly  to  the 
evidence  of  the  Vedas,  which,  curiously  enough,  was 
called  by  the  Vedantists  Pratyaksha,  that  is,  self- 
evident,  like  sense-perception. 

These  Nastikas,  a  name  not  applicable  to  mere 
dissenters,  but  to  out  and  out  nihilists  only,  are 
interesting  to  us  from  a  historical  point  of  view, 
because  in  arguing  against  other  philosophies,  they 
prove,  ipso  facto,  the  existence  of  orthodox  philo- 
sophical systems  before  their  time.  The  recognised 
schools  of  Indian  philosophy  could  tolerate  much  ; 
they  were  tolerant,  as  we  shall  see,  even  towards 
a  qualified  atheism,  like  that  of  the  Samkhya.  But 
they  had  nothing  but  hatred  and  contempt  for  the 
Nastikas,  and  it  is  for  that  very  reason,  and  on 
account  of  the  strong  feelings  of  aversion  which 
they  excited,  that  it  seemed  to  me  right  that  their 
philosophy  should  not  be  entirely  passed  over  by 
the  side  of  the  six  Vedic  or  orthodox  systems. 

Madhava,  in  his  Sarvadarsana-samgraha  or  the 
Epitome  of  all  philosophical  systems,  begins  with 
an  account  of  the  Nastika  or  TTarvaka  system.  He 
looks  upon  it  as  the  lowest  of  all,  but  nevertheless, 

K 


130  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

as  not  to  be  ignored  in  a  catalogue  of  the  philo- 
sophical   forces  of  India.     Aarvaka  (not  Aarvaka) 
is   given   as   the   name  of  a  Rakshasa,  and  he    is 
treated  as  a  historical  individual  to  whom  Brt'has- 
pati    or   ViU-aspati   delivered   his   doctrines.       The 
name  of  Aarvaka  is  clearly  connected  with  that  of 
Aarva,  and  this  is  given  as  a  synonym  of  Buddha 
by  Bala.s'astrin  in  the  Preface  to  his  edition  of  the 
Kasika  (p.   2).      He  is  represented  as  a  teacher  of 
the  Lokayata  or  world-wide  system,  if  that  is  the 
meaning  originally  intended  by  that  word.     A  short 
account  of  this   system  is  given   in   the   Prabodha- 
fcandrodaya  27,  18,  in  the  following  words:    'The 
Lokayata  system  in  which  the  senses  alone  form 
an    authority,    in    which    the    elements    are    earth, 
water,  fire,  and  wind  (not  Akasa  or  ether),  in  which 
wealth  and  enjoyment  form  the  ideals  of   man,  in 
which  the  elements  think,  the  other  world  is  denied, 
and    death    is   the  end  of  all  things.'     This    name 
Lokayata  occurs  already  in  Pamni's  Ga>ia  Ukthadi. 
It    should    be   noted    however,    that    Hema&andra 
distinguishes  between  Barhaspatya  or  Nastika,  and 
Aarvaka  or  Lokayatika,  though  he  does  not  tell  us 
which  he  considers  the  exact  points  on  which  the 
two  are  supposed  to  have  differed.     The  Buddhists 
use  Lokayata  for  philosophy  in  general.     The  state- 
ment that  the  Lokayatus  admitted  but  one  Pramana, 
i.  e.    authority  of  knowledge,  namely  sensuous  per- 
ception,  shows  clearly  that   there    must   have   been 
other    philosophical    systems    already   in    existence. 
We    shall    see    that    the  Vaiseshika    acknowledged 
two,   perception    (Pratyaksha)  and   inference   (Anu- 
mana)  ;     the    Sa?/ikhya    three,   adding    trustworthy 
affirmation   (Aptavakya)  ;    the  Nyaya   four,  adding 


THE    Bfl/HASPATI-PHILOSOPHY.  131 

comparison  (Upamana) ;  the  two  Mimamsas  six, 
adding  presumption  (Arthapatti)  and  privation 
(Abhava).  Of  these  and  others  we  shall  have  to 
speak  hereafter.  Even  what  seems  to  us  so  natural 
an  idea  as  that  of  the  four  or  five  elements,  required 
some  time  to  develop,  as  we  see  in  the  history  of  the 
Greek  a-To^ia,  and  yet  such  an  idea  was  evidently 
quite  familiar  to  the  ./Tarvakas.  While  other  systems 
admitted  five,  i.  e.  earth,  water,  fire,  air,  and  ether, 
they  admitted  four  only,  excluding  ether,  probably 
because  it  was  invisible.  In  the  Upanishads  we 
see  traces  of  an  even  earlier  triad  of  elements.  All 
this  shows  the  philosophical  activity  of  the  Hindus 
from  the  earliest  times,  and  exhibits  to  us  the  K&x- 
vakas  as  denying  rather  what  had  been  more  or  less 
settled  before  their  time,  than  as  adding  any  new 
ideas  of  their  own. 

So  it  is  again  with  regard  to  the  soul.  Not  only 
philosophers,  but  every  Arya  in  India  had  a  word 
for  soul,  and  never  doubted  that  there  was  some- 
thing in  man  different  from  the  visible  body.  The 
/Tarvakas  only  denied  this.  They  held  that  what 
was  called  soul  was  not  a  thing  by  itself,  but  was 
simply  the  body  over  again.  They  held  that  it 
was  the  body  that  felt,  that  saw  and  heard,  that 
remembered  and  thought,  though  they  saw  it  every 
day  rotting  away  and  decomposing,  as  if  it  never 
had  been.  By  such  opinions  they  naturally  came 
in  conflict  with  religion  even  more  than  with 
philosophy.  We  do  not  know  how  they  accounted 
for  the  evolution  of  consciousness  arid  intellect 
out  of  mere  flesh,  except  that  they  took  refuge 
with  a  simile,  appealing  to  the  intoxicating  power 
that  can  be  developed  by  mixing  certain  ingredi- 

K   2 


132  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ents,  which  by  themselves  are  not  intoxicating,  as 
an  analogy  to  the  production  of  soul  from  body. 

Thus  we  read  : — 

'  There  are  four  elements,  earth,  water,  fire,  and  air, 

And  from  these  four  elements  alone  is  intelligence 
produced— 

Just  like  the  intoxicating  power  from  Kinwa, 
&c.,  mixed  together  ; — 

Since  in  "  I  am  fat,"  "  I  am  lean,"  these  attributes 
abide  in  the  same  subject, 

And  since  fatness,  &c.,  resides  only  in  the  body, 
it  alone  is  the  soul  and  no  other, 

And  such  phrases  as  "  my  body  "  are  only  signi- 
ficant metaphorically.' 

In  this  way  the  soul  seems  to  have  been  to  them 
the  body  qualified  by  the  attribute  of  intelligence, 
and  therefore  supposed  to  perish  with  the  body. 
Holding  this  opinion,  it  is  no  wonder  that  they 
should  have  considered  the  highest  end  of  man 
to  consist  in  sensual  enjoyment,  and  that  they 
.should  have  accepted  pain  simply  as  an  inevitable 
concomitant  of  pleasure. 

A  verse  is  quoted  :— 

'  The  pleasure  which  arises  to  men  from  contact 
with  sensible  objects, 

Is  to  l)e  relinquished  as  accompanied  by  pain- 
such  is  the  warning  of  fools  ; 

The  berries  of  paddy,  rich  with  the  finest  white 
grains, 

What  man,  seeking  his  true  interest,  would  fiing 
them  away,  because  covered  with  husks  and  dust ]  '( ' 


1  See  for  those  vorsos  Cowell  and  Gough's  translation  of  the 
Sarvadarsana-sawgraha,  p.  4. 


THE    Bfl/HASPATI-PHILOSOPHY.  133 

From  all  this  we  see  that,  though  fundamental 
philosophical  principles  are  involved,  the  chief 
character  of  the  j^arvaka  system  was  practical,  rather 
than  metaphysical,  teaching  utilitarianism  and  crude 
hedonism  in  the  most  outspoken  way.  It  is  a  pity 
that  all  authoritative  books  of  these  materialistic 
philosophers  should  be  lost,  as  they  would  probably 
have  allowed  us  a  deeper  insight  into  the  early 
history  of  Indian  philosophy  than  the  ready-made 
manuals  of  the  six  Darsanas  on  which  we  have 
chiefly  to  rely.  The  following  verses  preserved  by 
Madhava  in  his  Epitome  are  nearly  all  we  possess 
of  the  teaching  of  Brihaspati  and  his  followers  : — 

'  Fire  is  hot,  water  cold,  and  the  air  feels  cool ; 

By  whom  was  this  variety  made  ?  (we  do  not 
know),  therefore  it  must  have  come  from  their  own 
nature  (Svabhava).' 

Bnhaspati  himself  is  held  responsible  for  the 
following  invective  :— • 

'  There  is  no  paradise,  no  deliverance,  and  certainly 
no  Self  in  another  world, 

Nor  are  the  acts  of  the  Asramas  (stations  in  life) 
or  the  castes,  productive  of  rewards. 

The  Agnihotra,  the  three  Vedas,  the  three  staves 
(carried  by  ascetics)  and  smearing  oneself  with  ashes, 

They  are  the  mode  of  life  made  by  their  creator ' 
for  those  who  are  devoid  of  sense  and  manliness. 

If  a  victim  slain  at  the  6ryotish£oma  will  go  to 
heaven, 

Why  is  not  his  own  father  killed  there  by  the 
sacrificer  ? 


1  Dhatri,  creator,  can  here  be  used  ironically  only,  instead  of 
Svabhava,  or  nature. 


134  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

If  the  *Sraddha-offering  gives  pleasure  to  beings 
that  are  dead, 

Then  to  give  a  viaticum  to   people  who  travel 
here  on  earth,  would  be  useless. 

If  those  who  are  in  heaven  derive  pleasure  from 
offerings, 

Then  why  not  give  food  here  to  people  while  they 
are  standing  on  the  roof? 

As  long  as  he  lives  let  a  man  live  happily ;  after 
borrowing  money,  let  him  drink  Ghee, 

How  can  there  be  a  return  of  the  body  after  it  has 
once  been  reduced  to  ashes  ? 

If  he  who  has  left  the  body  goes  to  another  world, 

Why  does  he  not  come  back  again  perturbed  by 
love  of  his  relations  ? 

Therefore  funeral  ceremonies  for  the  dead  were 
ordered  by  the  Brahmans. 

As  a  means  of  livelihood,  nothing  else  is  known 
anywhere. 

The  three  makers  of  the  Vedas  were  buffoons, 
knaves,  and  demons. 

The  speech  of  the  Pandits  is  (unintelligible),  like 
^r'arphari  Turphari. 

The  obscene  act  there  (at  the  horse  sacrifice)  to 
be  performed  by  the  queen  has  been 

Proclaimed  by  knaves,  and  likewise  other  things 
to  be  taken  in  hand. 

The  eating  of  flesh  was  likewise  ordered  by 
demons.' 

Tliis  is  certainly  very  strong  language,  as  strong 
;IK  any  that  has  ever  been  used  by  ancient  or 
modern  materialists.  It  is  well  that  we  should 
know  how  old  and  how  widely  spread  this 
materialism  was,  for  without  it  we  should  hardly 


THE    B5IHASPATI-PHILOSOPHY.  135 

understand  the  efforts  that  were  made  on  the 
other  side  to  counteract  it  by  establishing  the 
true  sources  or  measures  of  knowledge,  the  Pra- 
manas,  and  other  fundamental  truths  which  were 
considered  essential  both  for  religion  and  for 
philosophy.  The  idea  of  orthodoxy,  however,  is 
very  different  in  India  from  what  it  has  been 
elsewhere.  We  shall  find  philosophers  in  India 
who  deny  the  existence  of  a  personal  god  or 
Isvara,  and  who,  nevertheless,  were  tolerated  as 
orthodox  as  long  as  they  recognised  the  authority 
of  the  Veda,  and  tried  to  bring  their  doctrines 
into  harmony  with  Vedic  texts.  It  is  this  denial 
of  the  authority  of  the  Veda  which,  in  the  eyes  of 
the  Brahmans,  stamped  Buddha  at  once  as  a  heretic, 
arid  drove  him  to  found  a  new  religion  or  brother- 
hood, while  those  who  followed  the  Sa??ikhya,  and 
who  on  many  important  points  did  not  differ  much 
from  him,  remained  secure  within  the  pale  of 
orthodoxy.  Some  of  the  charges  brought  by  the 
Barhaspatyas  against  the  Brahmans  who  followed 
the  Veda  are  the  same  which  the  followers  of 
Buddha  brought  against  them.  Considering  there- 
fore, that  on  the  vital  question  of  the  authority 
of  the  Veda  the  Sa??ikhya  agrees,  however  incon- 
sistently, with  orthodox  Brahmanism  and  differs 
from  the  Buddhists,  it  would  be  far  easier  to  prove 
that  Buddha  derived  his  ideas  from  Brihaspati  than 
from  Kapila,  the  reputed  founder  of  the  Samkhya. 
If  we  are  right  in  the  description  we  have  given 
of  the  unrestrained  and  abundant  growth  of 
philosophical  ideas  in  ancient  India,  the  idea  of 
borrowing,  so  natural  to  us,  seems  altogether  out 
of  place  in  India.  A  wild  mass  of  guesses  at  truth 


136  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

was  floating  in  the  air,  and  there  was  no  controlling 
authority  whatever,  not  even,  as  far  as  we  know, 
any  binding  public  opinion  to  produce  anything  like 
order  in  it.  Hence  we  have  as  little  right  to 
maintain  that  Buddha  borrowed  from  Kapila  as 
that  Kapila  borrowed  from  Buddha.  No  one  would 
say  that  the  Hindus  borrowed  the  idea  of  building 
ships  from  the  Phenicians,  or  that  of  building 
Stupas  from  the  Egyptians.  In  India  we  move 
in  a  world  different  from  that  which  we  are  accus- 
tomed to  in  Greece,  Rome,  or  Modern  Europe,  and 
we  need  not  rush  at  once  to  the  conclusion  that, 
because  similar  opinions  prevail  in  Buddhism  and 
in  the  Sawkhya-philosophy  of  Kapila,  therefore 
the  former  must  have  borrowed  from  the  latter, 
or,  as  some  hold,  the  latter  from  the  former. 

Though  we  can  well  imagine  what  the  spirit 
of  the  philosophy  of  the  ancient  Indian  heretics, 
whether  they  are  called  TTarvakas  or  Barhaspatyas, 
may  have  been,  \ve  know,  unfortunately,  much  less 
of  their  doctrines  than  of  any  other  school  of 
philosophy.  They  are  to  us  no  more  than  names, 
such  as  the  names  of  Ya^Havalkya,  Raikva,  or  any 
other  ancient  leaders  of  Indian  thought  mentioned 
in  the  Upanishads,  and  credited  there  with  certain 
utterances.  We  know  a  few  of  the  conclusions  at 
which  they  arrived,  but  of  the  processes  by  which 
they  arrived  at  them  we  know  next  to  nothing. 
What  we  may  learn  from  these  utterances  is  that 
a  large  mass  of  philosophical  thought  must  have 
existed  in  India  long  before  there  was  any  attempt 
at  dividing  it  into  six  well-defined  channels  of 
systematic  philosophy,  or  reducing  it  to  writing. 
Even  when  the  names  of  certain  individuals,  such 


METEMPSYCHOSIS SAJJfSARA.  137 

as  6raimini,  Kapila,  and  others,  are  given  us  as  the 
authors  of  certain  systems  of  philosophy,  we  must 
not  imagine  that  they  were  the  original  creators 
of  a  philosophy  in  the  sense  in  which  Plato  and 
Aristotle  seem  to  have  been  so. 

Common  Philosophical  Ideas. 

It  cannot  be  urged  too  strongly  that  there 
existed  in  India  a  large  common  fund  of  philo- 
sophical thought  which,  like  language,  belonged  to 
no  one  in  particular,  but  was  like  the  air  breathed 
by  every  living  and  thinking  man.  Thus  only  can 
it  be  explained  that  we  find  a  number  of  ideas  in 
all,  or  nearly  all,  the  systems  of  Indian  philosophy 
which  all  philosophers  seem  to  take  simply  for 
granted,  and  which  belong  to  no  one  school  in 
particular. 

1.     Metempsychosis — Sawsara. 

The  best  known  of  these  ideas,  which  belong  to 
India  rather  than  to  any  individual  philosopher,  is 
that  which  is  known  under  the  name  of  Metempsy- 
chosis. This  is  a  Greek  word,  like  Metensomatosis, 
but  without  any  literary  authority  in  Greek.  It 
corresponds  in  meaning  to  the  Sanskrit  Sa?7isara, 
and  is  rendered  in  German  by  Seelenwanderung. 
To  a  Hindu  the  idea  that  the  souls  of  men  migrated 
after  death  into  new  bodies  of  living  beings,  of 
animals,  nay,  even  of  plants,  is  so  self-evident  that 
it  was  hardly  ever  questioned.  We  never  meet 
with  any  attempt  at  proving  or  disproving  it  among 
the  prominent  writers  of  ancient  or  modern  times. 
As  early  as  the  period  of  the  Upanishads  we  hear 
of  human  souls  being  reborn  both  in  animal  and 


138  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

in  vegetable  bodies.  In  Greece  the  same  opinion 
was  held  by  Empedocles  ;  but  whether  he  borrowed 
this  idea  from  the  Egyptians,  as  is  commonly 
supposed  to  have  been  the  case,  or  whether  Pytha- 
goras and  his  teacher  Pherecydes  learnt  it  in  India, 
is  a  question  still  hotly  discussed.  To  me  it  seems 
that  such  a  theory  was  so  natural  that  it  might 
perfectly  well  have  arisen  independently  among  dif- 
ferent races.  Among  the  Aryan  races,  Italian,  Celtic, 
and  Scythic  or  Hyperborean  tribes  are  mentioned 
as  having  entertained  a  faith  in  Metempsychosis, 
nay,  traces  of  it  have  lately  been  discovered  even 
among  the  uncivilised  inhabitants  of  America, 
Africa,  and  Eastern  Asia.  And  why  not  ?  In 
India  certainly  it  developed  spontaneously  ;  and  if 
this  was  so  in  India,  why  not  in  other  countries, 
particularly  among  races  belonging  to  the  same 
linguistic  stock  ?  It  should  be  remembered,  how- 
ever, that  some  systems,  particularly  the  Sa/wkhya- 
philosophy,  do  not  admit  what  we  commonly 
understand  by  Seeleuwanderung.  If  we  translate 
the  Sawkhya  Purusha  by  Soul  instead  of  Self,  it 
is  not  the  Purusha  that  migrates,  but  the  Sukshma- 
.sarira,  the  subtile  body.  The  Self  remains  always 
intact,  a  mere  looker  on,  and  its  highest  purpose 
is  this  recognition  that  it  is  above  and  apart  from 
anything  that  has  sprung  from  Prakr/ti  or  nature. 

2.     Immortality  of  the  Soul. 

The  idea  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul  also  should 
be  included  in  what  was  the  common  property  of  all 
Indian  philosophers.  This  idea  was  so  completely 
taken  for  granted  that  we  look  in  vain  for  any 
elaborate  arguments  in  support  of  it.  Mortality 


PESSIMISM.  139 

with  the  Hindus  is  so  entirely  restricted  to  the 
body  which  decays  and  decomposes  before  our 
very  eyes,  that  such  an  expression  as  Atmano 
*mHtatvam,  immortality  of  the  Self,  sounds  almost 
tautological  in  Sanskrit.  No  doubt,  the  followers  of 
Bn'haspati  would  deny  a  future  life,  but  all  the  other 
schools  rather  fear  than  doubt  a  future  life,  a  long- 
continued  metempsychosis ;  and  as  to  a  final  annihila- 
tion of  the  true  Self,  that  would  sound  to  Indian  ears 
as  a  contradiction  in  itself.  There  are  scholars  so 
surprised  at  this  unwavering  belief  in  a  future  and 
an  eternal  life  among  the  people  of  India,  that  they 
have  actually  tried  to  trace  it  back  to  a  belief  sup- 
posed to  be  universal  among  savages  who  thought 
that  man  left  a  ghost  behind  who  might  assume  the 
body  of  an  animal  or  even  the  shape  of  a  tree.  This 
is  a  mere  fancy,  and  though  it  cannot  of  course  be 
disproved,  it  does  not  thereby  acquire  any  right  to  our 
consideration.  Besides,  why  should  the  Aryas  have 
had  to  learn  lessons  from  savages,  as  they  at  one 
time  were  no  doubt  savages  themselves,  and  need  not 
have  forgotten  the  so-called  wisdom  of  savages  as 
little  as  the  >Sudras  themselves  from  whom  they  are 
supposed  to  have  learnt  it  ? 

3.     Pessimism. 

All  Indian  philosophers  have  been  charged  with 
pessimism,  and  in  some  cases  such  a  charge  may 
seem  well  founded,  but  not  in  all.  People  who 
derived  their  name  for  good  from  a  word  which 
originally  meant  nothing  but  being  or  real,  Sat, 
are  not  likely  to  have  looked  upon  what  is  as 
what  ought  not  to  be.  Indian  philosophers  are  by 
no  means  dwelling  for  ever  on  the  miseries  of  life. 


140  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

They  are  not  always  whining  and  protesting  that 
life  is  not  worth  living.  That  is  not  their  pessimism. 
They  simply  state  that  they  received  the  first  im- 
pulse to  philosophical  reflection  from  the  fact  that 
there  is  suffering  in  the  world.  They  evidently 
thought  that  in  a  perfect  world  suffering  had  no 
place,  that  it  is  something  anomalous,  something 
that  ought  at  all  events  to  be  accounted  for,  and, 
if  possible,  overcome.  Pain,  certainly,  seems  to  be 
an  imperfection,  and,  as  such,  may  well  have  caused 
the  question  why  it  existed,  and  how  it  could  be 
annihilated.  But  this  is  not  the  disposition  which 
we  are  accustomed  to  call  pessimism.  Indian  philo- 
sophy contains  no  outcry  against  divine  injustice, 
and  in  no  way  encourages  suicidal  expedients.  They 
would,  in  fact,  be  of  no  avail,  because,  according  to 
Indian  views,  the  same  troubles  and  the  same 
problems  would  have  to  be  faced  again  and  again  in 
another  life.  Considering  that  the  aim  of  all  Indian 
philosophy  was  the  removal  of  suffering,  which  was 
caused  by  nescience,  and  the  attainment  of  the 
highest  happiness,  which  was  produced  by  knowledge, 
we  should  have  more  right  to  call  it  eudsemonistic 
than  pessimistic. 

It  is  interesting,  however,  to  observe  the  unan- 
imity with  which  the  principal  systems  of  philosophy 
in  India,  nay  some  of  their  religious  systems  also, 
start  from  the  conviction  that  the  world  is  full  of 
suffering,  and  that  this  suffering  should  be  ac- 
counted for  and  removed.  This  seems  to  have  been 
one  of  the  principal  impulses,  if  not  the  principal 
impulse  to  philosophical  thought  in  India.  If  we 
begin  with  Cr'aimini,  we  cannot  expect  much  real 
philosophy  from  his  Purva-MimamsA,  which  is  chieHy 


PESSIMISM.  141 

concerned  with  ceremonial  questions,  such  as  sacrifices, 
&c.  But  though  these  sacrifices  are  represented  as 
being  the  means  of  a  certain  kind  of  beatitude,  arid 
so  far  as  serving  to  diminish  or  extinguish  the  ordi- 
nary afflictions  of  men,  they  were  never  supposed  to 
secure  the  highest  beatitude  for  which  all  the  other 
philosophers  were  striving.  The  Uttara-Mima?nsa 
and  all  the  other  philosophies  take  much  higher 
ground.  Badarayana  teaches  that  the  cause  of  all 
evil  is  Avidy4  or  nescience,  and  that  it  is  the  object 
of  his  philosophy  to  remove  that  nescience  by  means 
of  science  (Vidya),  and  thus  to  bring  about  that  true 
knowledge  of  Brahman,  which  is  also  the  highest 
bliss  (Taitt.  Up.  II,  i).  The  Samkhya- philosophy, 
at  least  such  as  we  know  it  from  the  Karikas  and 
the  Sutras,  not  however  the  Tattva-samasa,  begins 
at  once  with  the  recognition  of  the  existence  of  the 
three  kinds  of  suffering,  and  proclaims  as  its  highest 
object  the  complete  cessation  of  all  pain  ;  while  the 
Yoga  philosophers,  after  pointing  out  the  way  to 
meditative  absorption  (Samadhi),  declare  that  this 
is  the  best  means  of  escaping  from  all  earthly 
troubles  (II,  2),  and,  in  the  end,  of  reaching  Kai- 
valya  or  perfect  freedom.  The  Vaiseshika  promises 
to  its  followers  knowledge  of  truth,  and  through  it 
final  cessation  of  all  pain  ;  and  even  Gotama's  philo- 
sophy of  logic  holds  out  in  its  first  Sutra  complete 
blessedness  (Apavarga)  as  its  highest  reward,  which 
is  obtained  by  the  complete  destruction  of  all  pain 
by  means  of  logic.  That  Buddha's  religion  had  the 
same  origin,  a  clear  perception  of  human  suffering  and 
its  causes,  and  had  the  same  object,  the  annihilation 
of  DuAkha  or  suffering  (Nirva/ia)  is  too  well  known  to 
require  further  elucidation,  but  it  should  be  remeni- 


142  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

bered  that  other  systems  also  have  one  and  the  same 
name  for  the  state  to  which  they  aspire,  whether 
Nirvana  or  DuAkhanta,  i.  e.  end  of  DuAkha,  pain. 

If  therefore  all  Indian  philosophy  professes  its 
ability  to  remove  pain,  it  can  hardly  be  called  pessi- 
mistic in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word.  Even 
physical  pain,  though  it  cannot  be  removed  from 
the  body,  ceases  to  affect  the  soul,  as  soon  as  the 
Self  has  fully  realised  its  aloofness  from  the  body, 
while  all  mental  pain,  being  traced  back  to  our 
worldly  attachments,  would  vanish  by  freeing  our- 
selves from  the  desires  which  cause  these  attach- 
ments. The  cause  of  all  suffering  having  been 
discovered  in  ourselves,  in  our  works  and  thoughts, 
whether  in  this  or  in  a  previous  existence,  all 
clamour  against  divine  injustice  is  silenced  at  once. 
We  are  what  we  have  made  ourselves,  we  suffer  what 
we  have  done,  we  reap  what  we  have  sown,  and  it 
is  the  sowing  of  good  seed,  though  without  any 
hope  of  a  rich  harvest,  that  is  represented  as  the 
chief  purpose  of  a  philosopher's  life  on  earth. 

Besides  this  conviction  that  all  suffering  can  be 
removed  by  an  insight  into  its  nature  and  origin, 
there  are  some  other  ideas  which  must  be  traced  back 
to  that  rich  treasury  of  thought  which  was  open  to 
every  thinking  man  in  India.  These  common  ideas 
assumed,  no  doubt,  different  guises  in  different 
systems,  but  this  ought  not  to  deceive  us,  and  a 
little  reflection  allows  us  to  perceive  their  common 
source.  Thus,  when  the  cause  of  suffering  is  in- 
quired for,  they  all  have  but  one  answer  to  give, 
though  under  different  names.  The  Vedanta  gives 
Avidya,  nescience,  the  Sar/vkhya,  Aviveka,  non-dis- 
crimination, the  Nyaya,  Mithyiu/ftana,  false  know- 


K  ARM  AN.  143 

ledge,  and  these  various  aberrations  from  knowledge 
are  generally  represented  as  Bandha  or  bondage,  to 
be  broken  again  by  means  of  that  true  knowledge 
which  is  supplied  bythevarious  systems  of  philosophy. 

4.     Karman. 

The  next  idea  that  seems  ingrained  in  the  Indian 
mind  and  therefore  finds  expression  in  all  the 
systems  of  philosophy  is  a  belief  in  Karman,  deed, 
that  is,  the  continuous  working  of  every  thought, 
word,  and  deed  through  all  ages.  '  All  works,  good 
or  bad,  all  must  bear  and  do  bear  fruit/  is  a  senti- 
ment never  doubted  by  any  Hindu,  whether  to-day 
or  thousands  of  years  ago  l. 

And  the  same  eternity  which  is  claimed  for  works 
and  their  results  is  claimed  for  the  soul  also,  only 
with  this  difference,  that  while  works  will  cease  to 
work  when  real  freedom  has  been  obtained,  the 
soul  itself  continues  after  the  obtainment  of  freedom 
or  final  beatitude.  The  idea  of  the  soul  ever 
coming  to  an  end  is  so  strange  to  the  Indian  mind 
that  there  seemed  to  be  no  necessity  for  anything 
like  proofs  of  immortality,  so  common  in  European 
philosophy.  Knowing  what  is  meant  by  '  to  be,'  the 
idea  that  'to  be '  could  ever  become  '  not  to  be  ' 
seems  to  have  been  impossible  to  the  mind  of  the 
Hindus.  If  by  'to  be'  is  meant  Samsara  or  the  world, 
however  long  it  may  last,  then  Hindu  philosophers 
would  never  look  upon  it  as  real.  It  never  was, 
it  never  is,  and  never  will  be.  Length  of  time, 
however  enormous,  is  nothing  in  the  eyes  of  Hindu 

5  Cf.  The  Mysteries  of  Karma,  revealed  by  a  Brahmin  Yogee, 
Allahabad,  1898. 


144  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

philosophers.  To  reckon  a  thousand  years  as  one 
day  would  not  satisfy  them.  They  represent  length 
of  time  by  much  bolder  similes,  such  as  when  a  man 
once  in  every  thousand  years  passes  his  silken  ker- 
chief over  the  chain  of  the  Himalayan  mountains. 
By  the  time  he  has  completely  wiped  them  out  by 
this  process  the  world  or  Sawsara  may  indeed  come 
to  an  end,  but  even  then  eternity  and  reality  lie 
far  beyond.  In  order  to  get  an  easier  hold  of  this 
eternity,  the  very  popular  idea  of  Pralayas,  i.e.  de- 
structions or  absorptions  of  the  whole  world,  has 
been  invented.  According  to  the  Vedanta  there 
occurs  at  the  end  of  each  Kalpa  a  Pralaya  or  dis- 
solution of  the  universe,  and  Brahman  is  then 
reduced  to  its  causal  condition  (Karariavastha), 
containing  both  soul  and  matter  in  an  Avyakta 
(undeveloped)  state  \  At  the  end  of  this  Pralaya, 
however,  Brahman  creates  or  lets  out  of  himself 
a  new  world,  matter  becomes  gross  and  visible  once 
more,  and  souls  become  active  and  re-embodied, 
though  with  a  higher  enlightenment  (Vikasa),  and 
all  this  according  to  their  previous  merits  and  de- 
merits. Brahman  has  then  assumed  its  new  Karya- 
vastha  or  effective  state  which  lasts  for  another 
Kalpa.  But  all  this  refers  to  the  world  of  change 
and  unreality  only.  It  is  the  world  of  Karman,  the 
temporary  produce  of  Nescience,  of  Avidya,  or 
Maya,  it  is  not  yet  real  reality.  In  the  Sa?>ikhya- 
philosophy  these  Pralayas  take  place  whenever  the 
three  Gimas  of  Prakrit  i  recover  their  equipoise 2, 
while  creation  results  from  the  upsetting  of  the  equi- 
poise between  them.  What  is  truly  eternal,  is  not 


1  Thibaut,  V.  S.  I,  p.  xxviii.  2  Sawkhya-Sutras  VI,  42. 


K  ARM  AN.  145 

affected  by  the  cosmic  illusion,  or  at  least  is  so  for  a 
time  only,  and  may  recover  at  any  moment  its  self- 
knowledge,  that  is,  its  self-being,  and  its  freedom 
from  all  conditions  and  fetters. 

According  to  the  Vaiseshikas  this  process  of 
creation  and  dissolution  depends  on  the  atoms.  If 
they  are  separated,  there  ensues  dissolution  (Pralaya), 
if  motion  springs  up  in  them  and  they  are  united, 
there  follows  what  we  call  creation. 

The  idea  of  the  reabsorption  of  the  world  at  the 
end  of  a  Kalpa  (aeon)  and  its  emergence  again  in  the 
next  Kalpa,  does  not  occur  as  yet  in  the  old  Upani- 
shads,  nay  even  the  name  of  Samsara  is  absent  from 
them ;  and  Professor  Garbe  is  inclined  therefore 
to  claim  the  idea  of  Pralaya  as  more  recent,  as 
peculiar  to  the  Samkhya-philosophy,  and  as  adopted 
from  it  by  the  other  systems  *.  It  may  be  so,  but 
in  the  Bhagavad-git&  IX,  7,  the  idea  of  Pralayas, 
absorptions,  and  of  Kalpas  or  ages,  of  their  end 
and  their  beginning  (Kalpakshaye  and  Kalpadau), 
are  already  quite  familiar  to  the  poets.  The  exact 
nature  of  the  Pralayas  differs  so  much,  according  to 
different  poets  and  philosophers,  that  it  is  far  more 
likely  that  they  may  all  have  borrowed  it  from  a 
common  source,  that  is,  from  the  popular  belief  of 
those  among  whom  they  were  brought  up  and  from 
whom  they  learnt  their  language  and  with  it  the 
materials  of  their  thoughts,  than  that  they  should 
each  have  invented  the  same  theory  under  slightly 
varying  aspects. 

1  Sawkhya-Philosophie,  p.  221. 


146  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

5.     Infallibility  of  the  Veda. 

One  more  common  element  presupposed  by  Indian 
philosophy  might  be  pointed  out  in  the  recognition 
of  the  supreme  authority  and  the  revealed  char- 
acter ascribed  to  the  Veda.  This,  in  ancient  times, 
is  certainly  a  startling  idea,  familiar  as  it  may 
sound  to  us  at  present.  The  Sa?>ikhya-philosophy 
is  supposed  to  have  been  originally  without  a  belief 
in  the  revealed  character  of  the  Vedas,  but  it  cer- 
tainly speaks  of  /Sruti  (Sutras  I,  5).  As  long  as  we 
know  the  Samkhya,  it  recognises  the  authority  of 
the  Veda,  calling  it  /Sabda,  and  appeals  to  it  even 
in  matters  of  minor  importance.  It  is  important 
to  observe  that  the  distinction  between  $ruti  and 
Smn'ti,  revelation  and  tradition,  so  well  known  in 
the  later  phases  of  philosophy,  is  not  to  be  found 
as  yet  in  the  old  Upanishads. 

6.     Three  Guwas. 

The  theory  of  the  three  Gunas  also,  which  has 
been  claimed  as  originally  peculiar  to  the  Sawkhya- 
philosophy,  seems  in  its  unscientific  form  to  have 
been  quite  familiar  to  most  Hindu  philosophers. 
The  impulse  to  everything  in  nature,  the  cause  of 
all  life  and  variety,  is  ascribed  to  the  three  Gu^as. 
Gunn  means  quality,  but  we  are  warned  expressly 
not  to  take  it,  when  it  occurs  in  philosophy,  in  the 
ordinary  sense.;  of  quality,  but  rather  as  something 
substantial  by  itself,  so  that  the  Gumis  become  in 
fact  the  component  constituents  of  nature.  In  the 
most  general  sense  they  represent  no  more  than 
thesis,  antithesis,  and  something  between  the  two, 
such  as  cold,  warm,  and  neither  cold  nor  warm  ;  m>od, 

'     O 


THREE    GU7VAS.  147 

bad,  and  neither  good  nor  bad  ;  bright,  dark,  and 
neither  bright  nor  dark,  and  so  on  through  every  part 
of  physical  and  moral  nature.  Tension  between  these 
qualities  produces  activity  and  struggle:  equilibrium 
leads  to  temporary  or  final  rest.  This  mutual  ten- 
sion is  sometimes  represented  as  Vishamatvam,  un- 
evenness,  caused  by  a  preponderance  of  one  of  the 
three,  as  we  read,  for  instance,  in  the  Maitrayana 
Upanishad  V,  2  :  '  This  world  was  in  the  beginning 
Tamas  (darkness)  indeed.  That  Tamas  stood  in  the 
Highest.  Moved  by  the  Highest,  it  became  uneven. 
In  that  form  it  was  Ra^as  (obscurity).  That  llamas, 
when  moved,  became  uneven,  and  this  is  the  form  of 
Sattva  (goodness).  That  Sattva,  when  moved,  ran 
forth  as  essence  (Rasa).'  Here  we  have  clearly  the 
recognised  names  of  the  three  Gunas,  but  the  Maitra- 
yana  Upanishad  shows  several  Samkhya  influences, 
and  it  might  therefore  be  argued  that  it  does  not 
count  for  much,  in  order  to  establish  the  general 
acceptance  of  the  theory  of  the  Gunas,  not  for  more, 
at  all  events,  than  the  later  Upanishads  or  the 
Bhagavad-gita,  in  which  the  three  Gunas  are  fully 
recognised. 


L  2 


CHAPTEE   IV. 

Vedanta  or  Uttara-Mimawisa. 

IF  now  we  pass  on  to  a  consideration  of  the  six 
orthodox  systems  of  philosophy,  and  begin  with  the 
Vedanta,  we  have  to  take  as  our  chief  guides  the 
Sutras  of  Badarayana,  and  the  commentary  of 
*Sa,mkara.  We  know  little  of  Biidaraya?ia,  the  re- 
puted author  of  our  Sutras.  Of  course  when  we 
possess  commentaries  on  any  Sutras,  we  know  that 
the  Sutras  must  have  existed  before  their  com- 
mentaries, that  the  Sutras  of  Badaraya?ia  were 
older  therefore  than  Samkara,  their  commentator. 
In  India  he  has  been  identified  with  Vy;isa,  the 
collector  of  the  Mahabharata,  but  without  sufficient 
evidence,  nor  should  we  gain  much  by  that  identifi- 
cation, as  Vyasa  of  the  Mahabharata  also  is  hardly 
more  than  a  name  to  us.  This  Vyasa  is  said  by 
/Samkara,  III,  3,  32,  to  have  lived  at  the  end  of  the 
Dvapara  and  the  beginning  of  the  Kali  age,  and  to 
have  had  intercourse  with  the  gods,  I.e.,  I,  3,  33. 
But  though  he  calls  him  the  author  of  the  Maha- 
bharata, 1.  c.,  II,  3,  47,  *Samkara,  in  the  whole  of  his 
commentary  on  the  Vedanta-Sutras,  never  mentions 
that  the  Vyasa  of  the  epic  was  the  author  of  the 
book  on  which  he  is  commenting,  though  he  mentions 
Badarayana  as  such.  This  convinced  Windischmann 
that  ASamkara  himself  did  not  consider  these  two 
Vyasas  as  one  and  the  same  person,  and  this  judg- 


VEDANTA    OR    UTTARA-MIMA/VSA.  149 

ment  ought  not  to  have  been  lightly  disturbed.  It 
was  excusable  in  Colebrooke,  but  not  after  what  had 
been  said  byWindischmann,  particularly  when  no  new 
argument  could  be  produced.  All  we  can  say  is  that, 
whatever  the  date  of  the  Bhagavad-git4  is,  and  it  is 
a  part  of  the  Mahabharata,  the  age  of  the  Vedanta- 
Stitras  and  of  Badarayana  must  have  been  earlier. 

We  may  also  say  that  Badarayana  himself  never 
refers  to  any  work  which  could  be  assigned  with 
any  amount  of  certainty  to  any  time  after  our  era. 
Even  when  Badarayana  quotes  the  Snm'ti,  it  does 
not  follow  that  /Samkara  is  always  right  when 
suggesting  passages  from  the  Mahabharata  (Bhaga- 
vad-gita),  or  from  Manu,  for  it  is  not  too  much  to 
say  that  similar  passages  may  have  occurred  in  other 
and  more  ancient  Srnnti  works  also.  Badarayarai 
is  certainly  most  provoking  in  never  quoting  his 
authorities  by  name.  If  we  could  follow  $amkara. 
Badaraya^ia  would  have  referred  in  his  Sutras  to 
Bauddhas,  6rainas,  Pasupatas  and  Paft&aratras,  to 
Yogins,  Vaiseshikas,  though  not  to  Naiyayikas,  to 
Sawkhyas,  and  to  the  doctrines  of  (j'aimini1.  By  the 
name  of  Sruti  Badarayana,  according  to  $amkara, 
meant  the  following  Upanishads,  BHhad-aranyaka, 
/^Aandogya,  Kanaka,  Kaushitaki,  Aitareya,  Tait- 
tiriya,  Munc^aka,  Prasna,  /Svetasvatara,  and  6rabala. 

This  must  suffice  to  indicate  the  intellectual  sphere 
in  which  Badarayana  moved,  or  was  supposed  to  have 
moved,  and  so  far  may  be  said  to  determine  his 
chronological  position  as  far  anterior  to  that  of 
another  Vyasa,  who  was  the  father  of  $uka,  the 
teacher  of  Gauc?apada,  the  teacher  of  Govinda,  the 

1  Deussen,  System  des  Vedanta,  p.  24, 


150  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

teacher  of  $a?«kara,  and  who,  if  $a?>ikara  belonged 
to  the  eighth  century,  might  have  lived  in  about 
the  sixth  century  of  our  era  l. 

The  literary  works  to  which  >Sa??ikara  refers  in  his 
commentary  are,  according  to  Deussen  (System,  p.  34), 
among  the  Sa??ihitas,  that  of  the  Big-veda,  of  the 
Va^asaneyins,  Maitrayamyas  and  Taittiriyas,  and 
Ka^as,  (nothing  from  the  Sama  and  Atharva- 
samhitas)  ;  among  the  Brahmanas,  the  Aitareya, 
Arsheya,  Shac^viwisa,  /S'atapatha,  Taittiriya,  Ta/^c/ya, 
TTMndogya  ;  among  the  Arawyakas,  Aitareya  and 
Taittiriya ;  and  among  the  Upanishads,  Aitareya, 
Br&had-ararayaka,  L>a,  Ka^Aa,  Kaushitaki-brahmana, 
Kena,  jfiTAandogya,  Maitrayaniya,  Munc/aka,  Prasna, 
jSvetasvatara,  Taittiriya.  These  are  sometimes  called 
the  old  or  classical  Upanishads,  as  being  quoted  by 
$a?>ikara,  though  Paiwgi,  Agnirahasya,  Narayawlya 
and  G'abala  may  have  to  be  added.  As  belonging  to 
Smn'ti$amkara  quotes  Mahabharata  (Bhagavad-gita), 
Ramayana,  Marka/ic/eya-purana,  Manu,Yaska,  Pa?iini, 
Paribhashas,  Samkhya-karika,  and  he  refers  to  Sa??i- 
kliya-Sutras  (though  it  is  important  to  observe  that  he 
gives  no  ipsissima  verba  from  our  Samkhya-Sutras), 
to  Yoga-Sutras,  Nyaya-Sutras,  Vai.veshika-Sutras, 
and  to  Mlmamsa-Sfrfcras.  When  he  alludes  to  Sugata 
or  Buddha  he  refers  once  to  a  passage  which  has  been 
traced  in  the  Abhidharma-KosAa-vyakhya.  He  also 
knew  the  Bhagavatas  and  the  Svapiuidhyayavids. 

Though  the  name  of  Vedanta  does  not  occur  in  the 
old  Upanishads,  we  can  hardly  doubt  that  it  was  the 


1  Another  sternum  of  Vyasa,  given  by  native  writers,  is 
Naraya/w,  VasishMa,  (Padmabhava),  *S'akti,  Parasara,  Vyasa, 
.S'uka,  Gauf/apacla,  Hastamalaka  (*S'ishya),  Tro^aka,  Varttika- 
kara,  &c. 


VEDANTA    OR    UTTARA-MIMAMSA.  151 

Vedantic  thoughts,  contained  in  the  Upanishads, 
which  gave  the  first  impulse  to  more  systematic 
philosophical  speculations  in  India.  Several  scholars 
have  tried  to  prove  that  Samkhya  ideas  prevailed 
in  India  at  an  earlier  time  than,  the  Vedantic  ideas. 
But  though  there  certainly  are  germs  of  Samkhya 
theories  in  the  Upanishads,  they  are  but  few  and 
far  between,  while  the  strictly  Vedantic  concepts 
meet  us  at  every  step  in  the  hymns,  the  Brahma/ias, 
the  Aranyakas,  and  in  the  Sutras.  Vedanta  is  clearly 
the  native  philosophy  of  India.  It  is  true  that  this 
philosophy  is  not  yet  treated  systematically  in  the 
Upanishads,  but  neither  is  the  Samkhya.  To  us 
who  care  only  for  the  growth  of  philosophical 
thought  on  the  ancient  soil  of  India,  Vedanta  is 
clearly  the  first  growth  ;  and  the  question  whether 
Kapila  lived  before  Badarayana,  or  whether  the 
systematic  treatment  of  the  Samkhya  took  place 
before  that  of  the  Vedanta,  can  hardly  arise. 

I  only  wonder  that  those  who  maintain  the 
priority  of  the  Samkhya,  have  not  appealed  to 
the  Lalita-vistara,  twelfth  chapter,  where,  among 
the  subjects  known  to  Buddha,  are  mentioned  not 
only  Nirghar^u,  X/^andas,  Yagraakalpa,  6ryotisha,  but 
likewise  Samkhya,  Yoga,  Vaiseshika,  Vesika  (Vaid- 
yaka  ?),  Arthavidya,  Barhaspatya,  AsA'arya,  Asura, 
Mri'gapakshiruta,  and  Hetuvidya  (Nyaya).  There 
are  several  names  which  are  difficult  to  identify,  but 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  five  philosophical 
systems  here  mentioned  were  intended  for  Samkhya, 
Yoga,  Vaiseshika,  Nyaya,  and  Barhaspatya.  The 
two  Mimamsas  are  absent,  but  their  absence  does 
not  prove  that  they  did  not  exist,  but  only  that 
they  were  considered  too  orthodox  to  form  a  proper 


152  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

subject  of  study  for  Buddha.  This  shows  the  real 
character  of  the  antagonism  between  Buddhism  and 
Brahmanism,  now  so  often  denied  or  minimised1,  and 
is  confirmed  by  similar  references,  as  when  Hema- 
&andra  in  his  Abhidhana  mentions  indeed  such  names 
as  Arhatas  or  (9ainas,  Saugatas  or  Buddhists,  Naiya- 
yikas,  Yoga,  Samkhya  or  Kapila,  Vaiseshika,  Barhas- 
patya  or  Nastika,  AUrvaka  or  Lokayatika,  but 
carefully  omits  the  two  really  dangerous  systems, 
the  Mimamsa  of  Badarayana  and  that  of  6raimini. 

It  should  also  be  remembered  that  considerable 
doubt  has  recently  been  thrown  on  the  age  of  the 
Chinese  translation  of  the  Lalita-vistara,  which 
seemed  to  enable  us  to  assign  the  original  to  a  date 
at  all  events  anterior  to  70  A.  D.  The  case  is  not 
quite  clear  yet,  but  we  must  learn  to  be  more 
cautious  with  Chinese  dates. 

It  has  been  the  custom  to  give  the  name  of 
Vedanta-  philosophy  to  the  Uttara-Mimams4  of 
Badarayam,  nor  is  there  any  reason  why  that  name 
should  not  be  retained.  If  Vedanta  is  used  as 
synonymous  with  Upanishad,  the  Uttara-Mimawsa 
is  certainly  the  Vedanta-philosophy,  or  a  systematic 
treatment  of  the  philosophical  teaching  of  the 
Upanishads.  It  is  true,  no  doubt,  that  Vasish^a  as 
well  as  Gautama  distinguishes  between  Upanishads 
and  Vedantas  (XXII,  9),  and  the  commentator  to 
Gautama  XIX,  7  states  distinctly  that  those  parts 
only  of  the  Arawyakas  which  are  not  Upanishads 
are  to  be  called  Vedantas.  But  there  is  no  real  harm 
in  the  received  name,  and  we  see  that  the  followers 
of  the  Vedanta  were  often  called  Aupanislmdas. 

1  See  Brahmavadin,  Feb.,  1898,  p.  454. 


V*  BADARAYANA.  V  153 

Badarayawa. 

As  to  Badarayana,  the  reputed  author  of  the 
Vedanta-Sutras,  we  had  to  confess  before  that 
we  know  nothing  about  him.  He  is  to  us  a  name 
and  an  intellectual  power,  but  nothing  else.  We 
know  the  date  of  his  great  commentator,  /Samkara, 
in  the  eighth  century  A.D.,  and  we  know  that  another 
commentator,  Bodhayana,  was  even  earlier.  We 
also  know  that  Bodhayana' s  commentary  was  followed 
by  Kamanu^a.  It  is  quite  possible  that  Bodhayana, 
like  Ramanu^a,  represented  a  more  ancient  and  more 
faithful  interpretation  of  Badarayana's  Sutras,  and 
that  $amkara's  philosophy  in  its  unflinching  monism, 
is  his  own  rather  than  Badarayana's.  But  no  MS. 
of  Bodhayana  has  yet  been  discovered. 

A  still  more  ancient  commentator,  Upavarsha  by 
name,  is  mentioned,  and  /S'amkara  (III,  3,  53)  calls 
him  Bhagavad  or  Saint.  But  it  must  remain  doubt- 
ful again  whether  he  can  be  identified  with  the 
Upavarsha,  who,  according  to  the  Katha-sarit-sagara, 
was  the  teacher  of  Panini. 

It  must  not  be  forgotten  that,  according  to  Indian 
tradition,  Badarayana,  as  the  author  of  the  Vedanta- 
Sutras,  is  called  Vyasa  or  Vedavyasa,  Dvaipayana 
or  Krishna  Dvaipayana.  Here  we  are  once  more 
in  a  labyrinth  from  which  it  is  difficult  to  find  an 
exit.  Vyasa  or  Krishna  Dvaipayana  is  the  name 
given  to  the  author  of  the  Mahabharata,  and  no  two 
styles  can  well  be  more  different  than  that  of  the 
Vyasa  of  the  Mahabharata  and  that  of  Vyasa,  the 
supposed  author  of  the  so-called  Vyasa-Sutras.  I 
think  we  should  remember  that  Vyasa,  as  a  noun, 
meant  no  more  than  compilation  or  arrangement, 


154  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

as  opposed  to  Samasa,  conciseness  or  abbreviation ; 
so  that  the  same  story  might  be  recited  Samasena, 
in  an  abbreviated,  and  Vyasena,  in  a  complete 
form. 

We  should  remember  next  that  Vyasa  is  called 
Parasarya,  the  son  of  Parasara  and  Satyavati 
(truthful),  and  that  Pawini  mentions  one  Parasarya 
as  the  author  of  the  Bhikshu-Sutras,  while  Va/ras- 
pati  Misra  declares  that  the  Bhikshu-Sutras  are 
the  same  as  the  Vedanta-Sutras,  and  that  the 
followers  of  Parasarya  were  in  consequence  called 
Parasarins.  (Pan.  IV,  3,  no.) 

This,  if  we  could  rely  on  it,  would  prove  the 
existence  of  our  Sutras  before  the  time  of  Pamni, 
or  in  the  fifth  century  B.  c.  This  would  be  a  most 
important  gain  for  the  chronology  of  Indian  philo- 
sophy. But  if,  as  we  are  told,  Vyasa  collected 
(Vivyasa)  not  only  the  Vedas,  the  Mahabharata, 
the  Puranas,  but  also  the  Vyasa-Sutras,  nay  even 
a  prose  commentary  on  Pataf^ali's  Yoga-Sutras, 
we  can  hardly  doubt  that  the  work  ascribed  to 
him  must  be  taken  as  the  work  of  several  people 
or  of  a  literary  period  rather  than  of  one  man. 
I  formerly  thought  that  Vyasa  might  have  repre- 
sented the  period  in  which  the  first  attempts  were 
made  to  reduce  the  ancient  mnemonic  literature 
of  India  to  writing,  but  there  is  nothing  in  tradition 
to  support  such  a  view,  unless  we  thought  that 
Vyasa  had  some  connection  witli  Nyasa  (writing). 
Indian  tradition  places  the  great  Vyasa  between 
the  third  and  fourth  ages  of  the  present  world, 
whatever  that  may  mean,  if  translated  into  our 
modern  chronological  language.  If  Vyasa  had 
really  anything  to  do  witli  our  Vedanta-Sutras,  it 


BADARAYAJVA.  155 

would  hardly  have  been  more  than  that  he  arranged 
or  edited  them.  His  name  does  not  occur  in  the 
Sutras  themselves,  while  that  of  Badarayawa  does, 
and  likewise  that  of  Badari,  a  name  mentioned  by 
(raimini  also  in  his  Purva-Mimawisa l.  In  the  Bhaga- 
vad-gita, which  might  well  be  placed  as  contemporary 
with  the  Vedanta-Sutras,  or  somewhat  later,  Vyasa 
is  mentioned  as  one  of  the  Devarshis  with  Asita 
and  Devala  (X,  13),  and  he  is  called  the  greatest 
of  Rishis  (X,  37).  But  all  becomes  confusion  again, 
if  we  remember  that  tradition  makes  Vyasa  the 
author  of  the  Mahabharata,  and  therefore  of  the 
Bhagavad-gita  itself,  which  is  even  called  an  Upani- 
shad. 

The  only  passage  which  seems  to  me  to  settle 
the  relative  age  of  the  Vedanta-Sutras  and  the 
Bhagavad-gita  is  in  XIII,  32,  'Hear  and  learn  from 
me  the  Supreme  Soul  (Kshetrar/ria)  that  has  been 
celebrated  in  many  ways  by  Rishis  in  various  metres, 
and  by  the  words  of  the  Brahma-Sutras,  which  are 
definite  and  furnished  with  reasons.'  Here  the 
words  '  Brahma-sutra-padai/?,'  '  the  words  of  the 
Brahma-Sutras,'  seem  to  me  to  refer  clearly  to 
the  recognised  title  of  the  Vedanta  or  Brahma- 
Sutras.  Whatever  native  authorities  may  say  to 
the  contrary,  the  words  '  definite  and  argumenta- 
tive '  can  refer  to  Sutras  only.  And  if  it  is  said,  on 
the  other  side,  that  these  Brahma-Sutras,  when  they 
refer  to  Snm'ti,  refer  clearly  to  passages  taken  from 
the  Bhagavad-gita  also,  and  must  therefore  be  later, 
I  doubt  it.  They  never  mention  the  name  of  the 


Colebrooke,  M.  E.,  II,  p.  354. 

Prof.  T.  E.  Amalnerkar,  Priority  of  the  Vedanta-Sutras,  1895. 


156  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Bhagavad-gita,  nor  do  they  give  any  ipsissima  verba 
from  it,  and  as  every  Smrzti  presupposes  a  $ruti. 
these  references  may  have  been  meant  for  pas- 
sages which  the  Bhagavad-gita  had  adapted,  and 
may  have  shared  with  other  Snmtis.  Brahma- 
Sutra,  on  the  contrary,  is  a  distinct  title,  all  the 
more  significant  where  it  occurs,  because  neither 
the  word  Sutra  nor  Brahma-Sutra  occurs  ao;ain  in 

~ 

any  other  passage  of  the  Gita.  However,  even 
admitting  that  the  Brahma-Sutras  quoted  from  the 
Bhagavad-gita,  as  the  Gita  certainly  appeals  to 
the  Brahma-Sutras,  this  reciprocal  quotation  might 
be  accounted  for  by  their  being  contemporaneous, 
as  in  the  case  of  other  Sutras  which,  as  there  can 
be  no  doubt,  quote  one  from  the  other,  and  some- 
times verbatim. 

As  to  the  commentary  on  Pataf^ali's  Yoga-Sutras 
being  the  work  of  the  same  Vyasa,  this  seems  to 
me  altogether  out  of  the  question.  There  are 
hundreds  of  people  in  India  who  have  the  name 
of  Vyasa.  Nor  has  it  ever  been  positively  proved 
that  Pataf/r/ali,  the  reputed  author  of  the  Yoga- 
Sutras,  was  the  same  person  as  Pata/l^ali,  the  author 
of  the  Mahabhashya,  the  great  commentary  on 
Pa?iini's  grammar,  and  on  Katyayana's  Varttikas. 
Some  scholars  have  rushed  at  this  conclusion, 
chiefly  in  order  to  fix  the  date  of  the  Yoga-Sutras, 
but  this  also  would  force  us  to  ascribe  the  most 
heterogeneous  works  to  one  and  the  same  author  '. 

Even  the  age  of  Pata^r/ali,  the  grammarian  and 
author  of  the  Mahabhashya,  seems  to  me  by  no 


1  Botli  Lassen  and  Garbe,  Die  Sawkhya-Philosophie,  p.  46. 
seem  inclined  to  accept  the  identity  of  the  two  Puta%alis. 


BADARAYA.VA.  157 

means  positively  settled.  I  gladly  admit  the  plau- 
sibility of  Goldstiicker's  arguments  that  if  Pataft^ali 
presupposed  the  existence  of  the  Maurya-dynasty  he 
might  be  placed  in  the  third  century  B.C.  I  look 
upon  the  Ar&aA,  which  he  mentions  in  the  famous 
Maurya-passage,  as  having  been  devised  by  the 
Mauryas  for  the  sake  of  trade,  as  the  first  coins  with 
images  of  the  gods,  introduced  by  the  Maurya- 
dynasty.  Such  coins,  when  they  contain  images 
of  the  gods,  should  not,  according  to  the  gram- 
marian, be  called  simply  by  the  names  of  the  gods, 
but  by  a  derivative  name,  not  >Siva,  but  $ivaka, 
just  as  we  distinguish  between  an  Angel  and  an 
Angelot.  And  I  pointed  out  before,  the  very  gods 
mentioned  here  by  Pataf^/ali  are  the  gods  the 
images  of  which  do  occur  on  the  oldest  Indian  coins 
which  we  possess,  viz.  Siva,,  Skanda,  and  Visakha, 
the  last,  if  taken  for  Kama.  As  a  constructive  date 
therefore,  that  assigned  by  Goldstlicker  to  Pata%ali 
might  stand,  but  that  is  very  different  from  a  posi- 
tive date.  Besides,  the  name  of  Maurya  in  the  Maha- 
bhashya  is  doubtful  and  does  not  occur  again  in  it. 

We  saw  before  that  Badarayana  refers  in  his 
Sutras  to  6raimini,  the  author  of  the  Purva-Mimamsa- 
Sutras,  and  that  (7aimini  returns  the  compliment 
by  referring  to  Badarayawa  by  name.  Badaraya?ia 
is  likewise  acquainted  with  the  atheistical  doctrines 
of  Kapila  and  the  atomistic  theories  of  Kanada, 
and  tries  to  refute  them.  But  in  India  this  is 
far  from  proving  the  later  date  of  Badarayawa. 
We  must  learn  to  look  on  Badarayana,  6raimini, 
Kapila,  and  similar  names,  as  simply  eponymous 
heroes  of  different  philosophies  ;  so  that  at  what- 
ever time  these  systems  were  reduced  to  the  form 


158  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  Sutras,  certain  opinions  could  be  called  by  their 
names.  Colebrooke  states,  on  the  authority  of  a 
scholiast  to  Manu  and  Ya^fiavalkya,  that  the  instruc- 
tions of  a  teacher  were  often  reduced  to  writing  by  his 
pupils,  and  that  this  would  account  for  the  fact 
that  the  author  of  a  system  is  often  quoted  in  the 
third  person  in  his  own  book.  It  would  be  interest- 
ing if  this  could  be  established  with  reference  to 
ancient  texts,  but  I  remember  nothing  of  the  kind. 
All  this  is  very  discouraging  to  students  accustomed 
to  chronological  accuracy,  but  it  has  always  seemed 
to  me  far  better  to  acknowledge  our  poverty  and  the 
utter  absence  of  historical  dates  in  the  literary  history 
of  India,  than  to  build  up  systems  after  systems  which 
collapse  at  the  first  breath  of  criticism  or  scepticism. 
When  I  speak  of  a  chronology  of  thought,  what 
I  mean  is  that  there  is  a  chronology  which  enables 
us  to  distinguish  a  period  of  Yedic  thought,  sub- 
divided into  three  periods  of  Mantras,  Brahmanas, 
and  Upanishads.  No  one  would  doubt  the  succes- 
sion of  these  three  periods  of  language,  but  if  some 
scholars  wish  to  extend  each  period  to  thousands  of 
years,  I  can  only  wish  them  success.  I  confess  I  do 
not  share  the  idea  that  we  should  claim  for  Indian 
literature  as  remote  an  antiquity  as  possible.  The 
same  attempts  were  made  before,  but  nothing  was 
gained  by  them,  and  much  was  lost  as  soon  as  more 
sober  and  critical  ideas  began  to  prevail.  After  the 
Upanishad-period  would  follow  that  of  Buddhism, 
marked,  on  the  Buddhist  side,  by  the  Suttas,  on 
the  Brahmanic  side,  and  possibly  somewhat  earlier, 
by  the  large  mass  of  Sutra  literature.  To  that 
period  seem  to  me  to  belong,  by  similarity  of  thought, 
if  not  of  style,  the  six  systems  of  philosophy.  I 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.        159 

should  have  said  by  style  also,  because  the  earliest 
form  in  which  we  possess  these  systems  is  that  of 
Sutras.  Unfortunately  we  know  now  how  easily  even 
that  very  peculiar  style  can  be,  and  in  case  of  the 
Samkhya  and  some  of  the  legal  Smritis,  has  been 
imitated.  We  must  not  therefore  ascribe  too  much 
weight  to  this.  The  next  period  would  be  what 
I  have  called  that  of  the  Renaissance,  beginning  at 
a  time  when  Sanskrit  had  ceased  to  be  the  language 
spoken  by  the  people,  though  it  continued,  as  it  has 
to  the  present  day,  to  be  cultivated  by  the  learned. 
Such  are  the  difficulties  that  meet  us  when  we 
attempt  to  introduce  anything  like  chronological 
order  into  the  literature  of  India,  and  it  seems  to 
me  far  better  to  state  them  honestly  than  to  disguise 
them.  After  all,  the  importance  of  that  literature, 
and  more  particularly  of  its  philosophical  portion, 
is  quite  independent  of  age.  It  has  something  to 
teach  us  quite  apart  from  the  names  and  dates  of  its 
authors  ;  and  grateful  as  we  should  feel  for  any  real 
light  that  can  be  thrown  on  these  chronological  mazes, 
we  must  not  forget  that  the  highest  interest  of  the 
Vedanta  and  the  other  philosophies  is  not  their  age, 
but  their  truth. 

Fundamental  Doctrines  of  the  Vedanta. 

If  we  ask  for  the  fundamental  doctrines  of  the 
Vedanta,  the  Hindus  themselves  have  helped  us 
and  given  us  in  a  few  words  what  they  themselves 
consider  as  the  quintessence  of  that  system  of 
thought.  I  quoted  these  words  at  the  end  of  my 
'  Three  Lectures  on  the  Vedanta'  (1894)  :— 

'  In  one  half  verse  I  shall  tell  you  what  has  been 
taught  in  thousands  of  volumes  :  Brahman  is  true, 


l6o  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  world  is  false,  the  soul  is  Brahman  and  nothing 
else1.' 

And  again : — 

'  There  is  nothing  worth  gaining,  there  is  nothing 
worth  enjoying,  there  is  nothing  worth  knowing  but 
Brahman  alone,  for  he  who  knows  Brahman,  is 
Brahman.' 

This  resume  of  the  Vedanta  is  very  true,  and 
very  helpful  as  a  resume  of  that  system  of  philo- 
sophy. After  all  we  must  distinguish  in  every 
philosophy  its  fundamental  doctrines  and  its  minute 
details.  We  can  never  carry  all  these  details  in 
our  memory,  but  we  may  always  have  present  be- 
fore our  mind  the  general  structure  of  a  great  system 
of  thought  and  its  salient  points,  whether  it  be  the 
philosophy  of  Kant  or  of  Plato  or  of  Badaraya?ia.  It 
would  be  quite  impossible  in  a  historical  sketch  of 
the  six  Indian  philosophical  systems  to  give  all  their 
details.  They  are  often  unimportant,  and  may 
easily  be  gathered  from  the  texts  themselves,  such 
as  we  have  them  in  the  original  or  in  translations  ; 
but  they  must  not  be  allowed  to  crowd  and  to 
obscure  that  general  view  of  the  six  systems  which 
alone  is  meant  to  be  given  in  these  pages. 

We  have  another  and  still  shorter  abstract  of  the 
Vedanta  in  the  famous  words  addressed  by  Uddalaka 
Arum  to  his  son  £vetaketu  (AMnd.  Up.  VI,  8), 
namely, ' Tat  tvam  asi,' ' Thou  art  That.'  These  words, 
however,  convey  little  meaning  without  the  context 
in  which  they  occur,  that  is  to  say,  unless  we  know 
what  is  meant  by  the  Tat,  that,  and  by  the  Tvam, 
thou.  The  Tat  is  what  we  saw  shadowed  forth  in 

1  See  also  Theosophy,  p.  3 1 7. 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.       l6l 

the  Upanishads  as  the  Brahman,  as  the  cause  of 
the  world,  the  Tvam  is  the  Atman,  the  Self  in 
its  various  meanings,  from  the  ordinary  I  to  the 
divine  Soul  or  Self,  recognised  in  man  ;  and  it  is 
the  highest  aim  of  the  Vedanta  to  show  that  these 
two  are  in  reality  one1.  This  fearless  synthesis, 
embodied  in  the  simple  words  Tat  tvam  asi,  seems 
to  me  the  boldest  and  truest  synthesis  in  the  whole 
history  of  philosophy.  Even  Kant,  who  clearly 
recognised  the  Tat  or  it,  that  is  the  Ding  an  sich 
behind  the  objective  world,  never  went  far  enough 
to  recognise  the  identity  of  the  Tat,  the  objective 
Ding  an  sich,  and  the  Tvam,  the  Ding  an  sich  on 
the  subjective  side  of  the  world.  Among  ourselves 
such  a  synthesis  of  the  subjective  with  the  objective 
Self  would  even  now  rouse  the  strongest  theological, 
if  not  philosophical,  protests,  whereas  the  theologians 
of  India  discuss  it  with  perfect  equanimity,  and  see 
in  it  the  truest  solution  of  the  riddle  of  the  world. 
In  order  fully  to  understand  it,  we  must  try  to 
place  ourselves  firmly  on  the  standpoint  of  the 
Vedanta  philosophers,  forgetting  all  our  own  in- 
herited theological  misgivings.  Their  idea  of  the 
Supreme  Cause  of  the  universe  went  far  beyond 
what  is  meant  by  God,  the  creator  and  ruler  of  the 
world  (Prar/apati).  That  being  was  to  them  a  mani- 
festation only  of  the  Supreme  Cause  or  Brahman,  it 
was  Brahman  as  phenomenal,  and  it  followed  that, 
as  Brahman,  as  they  held,  was  indeed  the  cause  of 
everything,  the  All  in  All,  man  also  could  be  nothing 
but  a  phenomenon  of  Brahman.  The  idea  therefore 
that  it  would  be  blasphemy  to  make  the  creature 

1  Mawdukya  Up.  II,  Ayam  Atma  Brahma. 
M 


1 62  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

equal  to  the  creator  so  far  as  their  substance  was 
concerned,  never  presented  itself  to  their  minds. 
Their  Tat  was  something  behind  or  above  the  purely 
personal  creator,  it  was  the  absolute  divine  essence, 
the  Godhead,  manifested  in  a  subjective  and  personal 
creator,  and  present  likewise  in  all  its  phenomenal 
manifestations,  including  gods  and  men.  Even  their 
god  beyond  all  gods  (Deveshu  adhi  ekaA)  did  not 
satisfy  them  any  longer,  as  it  did  in  the  hymns  of  the 
Rig-veda  ;  and  though  they  might  have  shrunk  from 
identifying  gods  and  men  with  that  personal  divine 
being,  Prar/cipati,  the  lord  of  all  creatures,  they  saw 
nothing  but  truth  in  the  doctrine  that  man  in  his  true 
nature  was  the  same  with  Brahman,  that  he  shares  in 
the  nature  of  Brahman,  or  in  the  spirit  of  God.  They 
saw,  in  fact,  that  God  is  hardly  a  name  that  can  be 
used  for  that  Supreme  Brahman,  the  absolute  Cause 
of  the  universe,  and  the  absolute  Cause  of  Pra<yapati 
also,  wrhen  taken  as  the  creative  god.  I  say  when 
taken  as  such,  for  we  ought  never  to  forget  that  we 
have  always  to  be  satisfied  with  what  we  take  God 
to  be  ( Vidyamatra),  and  that  we  can  never  go  beyond. 
Translated  into  the  language  of  the  early  Christian 
philosophers  of  Alexandria,  this  lifting  up  of  the  Tvam 
into  the  Tat  might  prove  the  equivalent  of  the  idea 
of  divine  sonship,  but  from  the  Vedanta  point  of  view 
it  means  real  identity,  real  recognition  of  the  original 
divine  nature  of  man,  however  much  hidden  and  dis- 
figured for  a  time  by  Avidya,  or  ignorance,  and  all  its 
consequences.  With  us  unfortunately  such  questions 
can  hardly  be  discussed  in  a  calm  philosophical  spirit, 
because  theology  steps  in  and  protests  against  them 
as  irreligious  and  blasphemous,  just  as  the  Jews  de- 
clared it  blasphemy  in  Christ  to  teach  that  He  was 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.        163 

equal  to  God,  nay  that  He  and  the  Father  were  one, 
Tat  tvam  asi.  If  properly  understood,  these  Vedanta 
teachings  may,  though  under  a  strange  form,  bring 
us  very  near  to  the  earliest  Christian  philosophy, 
and  help  us  to  understand  it,  as  it  was  understood 
by  the  great  thinkers  of  Alexandria.  To  maintain 
the  eternal  identity  of  the  human  and  the  divine  is 
very  different  from  arrogating  divinity  for  humanity  ; 
and  on  this  point  even  our  philosophy  may  have 
something  to  learn  which  has  often  been  forgotten 
in  modern  Christianity,  though  it  was  recognised  as 
vital  by  the  early  fathers  of  the  Church,  the  unity 
I  of  the  Father  and  the  Son,  nay,  of  the  Father  and 
all  His  sons. 

The  teachers  of  the  Vedanta,  while  striving  to 
resuscitate  in  man  the  consciousness  of  the  identity 
of  the  Tat  and  the  Tvam,  arid,  though  indirectly, 
of  man  and  God,  seem  to  be  moving  in  the  most 
serene  atmosphere  of  thought,  and  in  their  stiff  and 
algebraic  Sutras  they  were  working  out  these  mighty 
problems  with  unfaltering  love  of  truth,  and  in  an 
unimpassioned  and  truly  philosophic  spirit. 

It  is  as  difficult  to  give  an  idea  of  the  form  of 
the  Upanishads  as  of  the  spirit  that  pervades  the 
Upanishads.  A  few  extracts,  however,  may  help  to 
show  us  the  early  Vedantists  as  they  were,  groping 
their  way  in  the  dark.  We  do  not  indeed  get  there 
the  pure  wine  of  the  Vedanta,  but  we  get  the  grapes 
from  which  the  juice  was  extracted  and  made  into 
wine.  The  first  is  taken  from  the  JTMndogya  Upani- 
shad  wThich  belongs  to  the  Sama-veda  and  is  generally 
regarded  as  one  of  the  earlier  Upanishads  *. 


1  Translated  in  S.  B.  E.,  I,  p.  92 
M  2 


164  INDIAN  PHILOSOPHY. 

FIRST  KHANDA. 

1.  /Svetaketu  was  the  son  of  Arum,  the  grandson 
of  Arima.     To  him  his  father  (Uddalaka,  the   son 
of  Arima)  said :  '  $vetaketu,  go  to  school ;  for  there 
is  none  belonging  to    our   race,   darling,   who,  not 
having  studied  (the  Veda),  is,  as  it  were,  a  Brahma- 
bandhu,  i.e.  a  Brahma?ia  by  birth  only.' 

2.  Having    begun    his    apprenticeship    (with    a 
teacher)  when  he  was  twelve  years  of  age,  /Sveta- 
ketu  returned  to  his  father,  when  he  was  twenty- 
four,  having  then  studied  all  the  Vedas, — conceited, 
considering  himself  well-read,  and  stubborn. 

3.  His  father  said  to  him  :    '  $vetaketu,  as  you 
are    so    conceited,    considering   yourself  well-read, 
and  so  stubborn,  my  dear  son,  have  you  ever  asked 
for  that  instruction  by  which  we  hear  what  is  not 
heard,  by  which  we  perceive  what  is  not  perceived, 
by  which  we  know  what  is  not  known  ? ' 

4.  '  What  is  that  instruction,  Sir  ? '  he  asked. 
The  father  replied  :  '  My  dear  son,  as  by  one  clod 

of  clay  all  that  is  made  of  clay  is  known,  the  differ- 
ence being  only  the  name,  arising  from  speech,  but 
the  truth  being  that  all  is  clay  ; 

5.  '  And  as,  my  dear  son,  by  one  nugget  of  gold 
all   that   is   made  of  gold  is   known,  the  difference 
being  only  the  name,  arising  from  speech,  but  the 
truth  being  that  all  is  gold ; 

6.  '  Arid  as,  my  dear  son,  by  one  pair  of  nail-scissors 
all  that  is  made  of  steel  (Karsrmayasam)  is  known, 
the  difference   being    only  the    name,   arising  from 
speech,  but  the  truth  being  that  all  is  steel, — thus, 
rny  dear  son,  is  that  instruction.' 

7.  The    son   said :    '  Surely  those   venerable    men 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.        165 

(my  teachers)  did  not  know  that.  For  if  they  had 
known  it,  why  should  they  not  have  told  it  me  ? 
Do  you,  Sir,  therefore  tell  me  that.'  '  Be  it  so,' 
said  the  father. 


SECOND 

1.  'In  the   beginning,  my  dear   son,  there  was 
that  only  which  is  (TO  6V),  one  only,  without  a  second. 
Others  say,  in  the  beginning  there  was  that  only 
which  is  not  (TO  ^  6V),  one  only,  without  a  second  ; 
and   from   that   which  is  not,  that   which  is,   was 
born. 

2.  '  But  how  could  it  be  so,  my  dear  son  ?  '  the 
father  continued.     '  How  could   that  which  is,  be 
born  of  that  which  is  not  ?     No,  my  dear  son,  only 
that  which  is,  was  in  the  beginning,  one  only,  without 
a  second. 

3.  'It   thought,    may  I    be   many,  may    I   grow 
forth.     It  sent  forth  fire. 

'  That  fire  thought,  may  I  be  many,  may  I  grow 
forth.  It  sent  forth  water. 

'  And  therefore  whenever  anybody  anywhere  is 
hot  and  perspires,  water  is  produced  on  him  from 
fire  alone. 

4.  '  Water  thought,  may  I  be  many,  may  I  grow 
forth.     It  sent  forth  earth  (food). 

'  Therefore  whenever  it  rains  anywhere,  most  food 
is  then  produced.  From  water  alone  is  eatable 
food  produced. 

SEVENTH  KHAJVTDA. 

i  .  '  Man  (Purusha),  my  son,  consists  of  sixteen 
parts.  Abstain  from  food  for  fifteen  days,  but 
drink  as  much  water  as  you  like,  for  breath  comes 


1 66  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

from  water,  and  will  not  be  cut  off,  if  you  drink 
water.' 

2.  /SVetaketu  abstained  from  food  for  fifteen  days. 
Then  he  came  to  his  father  and  said  :  '  What  shall 
I  say  ? '     The  father  said  :  '  Repeat  the  Rile,  Ya^us, 
and    Saman   verses.'      He    replied :    '  They   do   not 
occur  to  me,  Sir.' 

3.  The  father  said  to  him  :  'As  of  a  great  lighted 
fire  one  coal  only  of  the  size  of  a  firefly  may  be  left, 
which  would  not  burn  much  more  than  this  (i.  e.  very 
little),  thus,  my  dear  son,  one  part  only  of  the  sixteen 
parts  (of  you)  is  left,  and  therefore  with  that  one  part 
you  do  not  remember  the  Vedas.     Go  and  eat ! 

4.  '  Then  wilt  thou  understand  me.'     Then  Sve- 
taketu  ate,  and  afterwards  approached  his  father. 
And  whatever  his  father  asked  him,  he  knew  it  all 
by  heart.     Then  his  father  said  to  him  : 

5.  '  As  of  a  great  lighted  fire  one  coal  of  the  size 
of  a  firefly,  if  left,  may  be  made  to  blaze  up  again 
by  putting  grass  upon  it,  and  will  thus  burn  more 
than  this, 

6.  '  Thus,  my  dear  son,  there  was  one  part  of  the 
sixteen  parts  left  to  you,  and  that,  lighted  up  with 
food,  burnt  up,  and   by  it  you  remember  now  the 
Vedas.'     After  that,  he  understood  what  his  father 
meant  when  he  said  :  '  Mind,  my  son,  comes  from 
food,    breath    from    water,    speech    from    fire.'      He 
understood  what  he  said,  yea,  he  understood  it. 

NINTH  KB.ANDA. 

1.  'As   the  bees,   my   son,   make   honey  by  col- 
lecting the  juices  of  distant  trees,  and  reduce  the 
juice  into  one  form, 

2.  '  And  as  these  juices  have   no  discrimination, 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.        167 

so  that  they  might  say,  I  am  the  juice  of  this  tree 
or  that,  in  the  same  manner,  my  son,  all  these 
creatures,  when  they  have  become  merged  in  the 
True  (either  in  deep  sleep  or  in  death),  know  not 
that  they  are  merged  in  the  True. 

3.  '  Whatever  these  creatures  are  here,  whether 
a  lion,  or  a  wolf,  or  a  boar,  or  a  worm,  or  a  midge. 
or  a  gnat,  or  a  musquito,  that  they  become  again 
and  again. 

4.  '  Now  that  which  is  that  subtile  essence,  in  it 
all  that  exists  has  its  Self.     It  is  the  True.     It  is 
the  Self,  and  thou,  0  /SVetaketu,  art  it.' 

'  Please,  Sir,  inform  me  still  more,'  said  the  son. 
'  Be  it  so,  my  child,'  the  father  replied. 


TENTH 

1.  '  These  rivers,  my  son,  run,  the  eastern  (like  the 
Ganga)  toward  the  east,  the  western  (like  the  Sindhu) 
toward  the  west.     They  go  from  sea  to  sea  (i.  e.  the 
clouds  lift  up  the  water  from  the  sea  to  the  sky,  and 
send  it  back  as  rain  to  the  sea).    They  become  indeed 
sea.     And  as  those  rivers,  when  they  are  in  the  sea, 
do  not  know,  I  am  this  or  that  river, 

2.  '  In  the  same  manner,  my  son,  all  these  crea- 
tures, when  they  have  come  back  from  the  True, 
know  not  that  they  have  come  back  from  the  True. 
Whatever  these  creatures  are  here,  whether  a  lion,  or 
a  wolf,  or  a  boar,  or  a  worm,  or  a  midge,  or  a  gnat, 
or  a  musquito,  that  they  become  again  and  again. 

3.  '  That  which  is  that  subtile  essence,  in  it  all 
that  exists  has  its  Self.     It  is  the  True.     It  is  the 
Self,  and  thou,  0  >Svetaketu,  art  it.' 

'  Please,  Sir,  inform  me  still  more,'  said  the  son. 
'  Be  it  so,  my  child,'  the  father  replied. 


1  68  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 


ELEVENTH 

i  .  '  If  one  were  to  strike  at  the  root  of  this  large 
tree  here,  it  would  bleed,  but  it  would  live.  If  he  were 
to  strike  at  its  stem,  it  would  bleed,  but  it  would  live. 
If  he  were  to  strike  at  its  top,  it  would  bleed,  but  it 
would  live.  Pervaded  by  the  living  Self  that  tree 
stands  firm,  drinking  in  its  nourishment  and  rejoicing  ; 

2.  '  But  if  the  life  (the  living  Self)  leaves  one 
of  its  branches,   that  branch  withers  ;    if  it  leaves 
a  second,  that  branch  withers  ;  if  it  leaves  a  third, 
that  branch  withers.    If  it  leaves  the  whole  tree,  the 
whole  tree  withers.      In  exactly  the  same  manner, 
my  son,  know  this.'     Thus  he  spoke  : 

3.  '  This  (body)  indeed  withers  and  dies  when  the 
living  (Self)  has  left  it  ;  the  living  (Self)  dies  not. 

'  That  which  is  that  subtile  essence,  in  it  all  that 
exists  has  its  Self.  It  is  the  True.  It  is  the  Self, 
and  thou,  $vetaketu,  art  it.' 

'  Please,  Sir,  inform  me  still  more,'  said  the  son. 

'  Be  it  so,  my  child,'  the  father  replied. 

TWELFTH  KHA#Z>A. 

i  .  '  Fetch  me  from  thence  a  fruit  of  the  Nyagrodha 
tree.' 

'  Here  is  one,  Sir.' 

'  Break  it.' 

'  It  is  broken,  Sir.' 

'  What  do  you  see  there  ?  ' 

'These  seeds,  almost  infinitesimal.' 

'  Break  one  of  them.' 

'  It  is  broken,  Sir.' 

'  What  do  you  see  there  ?  ' 

'  Not  anything,  Sir.' 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.        169 

2.  The  father  said:  'My  son,  that  subtile  essence 
which   you    do   not    perceive   there,    of    that   very 
essence  this  great  Nyagrodha  tree  exists. 

3.  '  Believe  it,  my  son.    That  which  is  the  subtile 
essence,   in    it  all  that  exists  has  its   Self.     It  is 
the  True.    It  is  the  Self,  and  thou,  O  /Svetaketu, 
art  it/ 

'  Please,  Sir,  inform  me  still  more/  said  the  son. 
'  Be  it  so,  my  child/  the  father  replied. 


THIRTEENTH 

1.  '  Place  this  salt  in  water,  and  then  wait  on  me 
in  the  morning/ 

The  son  did  as  he  was  commanded. 

The  father  said  to  him  ;  '  Bring  me  the  salt,  which 
you  placed  in  the  water  last  night/ 

The  son  having  looked  for  it,  found  it  not,  for,  of 
course,  it  was  melted. 

2.  The  father  said  :  '  Taste  it  from  the  surface  of 
the  water.     How  is  it  ?  ' 

The  son  replied  :  '  It  is  salt/ 

'  Taste  it  from  the  middle.     How  is  it  ?  ' 

The  son  replied  :  '  It  is  salt/ 

'  Taste  it  from  the  bottom.     How  is  it  ?  ' 

The  son  replied  :  '  It  is  salt/ 

The  father  said  :  '  Throw  it  away  and  then  wait 
on  me/ 

He  did  so  ;   but  the  salt  continued  to  exist. 

Then  the  father  said  :  '  Here  also,  in  this  body, 
indeed,  you  do  not  perceive  the  True  (Sat),  my 
son  ;  but  there  indeed  it  is. 

3.  '  That  which  is  the  subtile  essence,  in  it  all  that 
exists  has  its  Self.     It  is  the  True.     It  is  the  Self, 
and  thou,  0  $vetaketu,  art  it/ 


170  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

'  Please,  Sir,  inform  me  still  more,'  said  the  son. 
'  Be  it  so,  my  child/  the  father  replied. 

FOURTEENTH  KHA^Z>A. 

1.  'As  one  might  lead   a  person  with   his  eyes 
covered  away  from  the  Gandharas,  and  leave  him 
then  in  a  place  where  there  are  no  human  beings  ; 
and  as  that  person  would  turn  towards  the  east,  or 
the  north,  or  the  west,  and  shout,  "  I  have  been 
brought   here  with  my  eyes  covered,  I  have  been 
left  here  with  my  eyes  covered," 

2.  'And  as  thereupon  some  one  might  loose  his 
bandage  and  say  to  him,  "  Go  in  that  direction,  it 
is  the   Gandharas,  go  in  that   direction  ; "   and  as 
thereupon,  having  been  informed  and  being  able  to 
judge  for  himself,  he  would  by  asking  his  way  from 
village  to  village  arrive  at  last  at  the  Gandharas,— 
in  exactly  the  same  manner  does  a  man,  who  meets 
with  a  teacher  to  inform  him,  learn  that  there  is 
delay  so  long  only  as  "  I  am  not  delivered  (from  this 
body);  and  then  I  shall  be  perfect." 

3.  'That  which   is   the  subtile   essence,  in   it  all 
that  exists  has  its  Self.     It  is  the  True.     It  is  the 
Self,  and  thou,  O  /Svetaketu,  art  it.' 

'  Please,  Sir,  inform  me  still  more,'  said  the  son. 
'  Be  it  so,  my  child,'  the  father  replied. 

FIFTEENTH  KHAAT/)A. 

i .  '  If  a  man  is  ill,  his  relatives  assemble  round 
him  and  ask  :  "  Dost  thou  know  me  ?  Dost  thou 
know  me  ? "  Then,  as  long  as  his  speech  is  not 
merged  in  his  mind,  his  mind  in  breath,  breath  in 
heat  (fire),  heat  in  the  Highest  Being  (Devata),  he 
knows  them. 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.        171 

2.  '  But  when  his  speech  is  merged  in  his  mind, 
his  mind  in  breath,  breath  in  heat  (fire),  heat  in  the 
Highest  Being,  then  he  knows  them  not. 

*  That  which  is  the  subtile  essence,  in  it  all  that 
exists  has  its  Self.  It  is  the  True.  It  is  the  Self, 
and  thou,  0  /Svetaketu,  art  it.' 

'  Please,  Sir,  inform  me  still  more,'  said  the  son. 

'  Be  it  so,  my  child,'  the  father  replied. 

The  next  extract  is  from  the  Ka^Aa  Upanishad 
of  the  Ya^ur-veda,  and  has  by  many  scholars  been 
classed  as  of  later  date. 

FIRST  VALLI. 

i.  Va^asravasa,  desirous  (of  heavenly  rewards), 
surrendered  (at  a  sacrifice)  all  that  he  possessed.  He 
had  a  son  of  the  name  of  Na&iketas. 

4.  He  (knowing  that  his  father  had  promised  to 
give  up  at  a   sacrifice  all  that  he   possessed,  and 
therefore  his   son   also)   said  to  his  father :  '  Dear 
father,  to  whom  wilt  thou  give  me  ? ' 

He  said  it  a  second  and  a  third  time.  Then  the 
father  replied  (angrily)  : 

'  I  shall  give  thee  unto  Death.' 

(The  father,  having  once  said  so,  though  in  haste, 
had  to  be  true  to  his  word  and  to  sacrifice  his  son.) 

5.  The  son  said  :  '  I  go  as  the  first,  at  the  head 
of  many  (who  have  still  to  die)  ;  I  go  in  the  midst 
of  many  (who  are  now  dying).     What  will  be  the 
work  of  Yama  (the  ruler   of  the    departed)   which 
to-day  he  has  to   do  unto  me  ? 

6.  '  Look  back  how  it  was  with  those  who  came 
before,  look  forward  how  it  will  be  with  those  who 
come  hereafter.     A   mortal   ripens   like    corn,   like 
corn   he  springs  up  again.' 


172  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

(Na&iketas  then  enters  into  the  abode  of  Yama 
Vaivasvata,  and  there  is  no  one  to  receive  him. 
Thereupon  one  of  the  attendants  of  Yama  is  sup- 
posed to  say :) 

7.  '  Fire  enters  into  the  houses,  when  a  Brahmana 
enters  as  a  guest.     That  fire  is  quenched  by  this 
peace-offering  ; — bring  water,  0  Vaivasvata  ! 

8.  '  A  Brahmana  that  dwells  in  the  house  of  a 
foolish  man  without  receiving  food  to  eat,  destroys 
his   hopes   and    expectations,    his    possessions,    his 
righteousness,  his  sacred  and  his  good  deeds,  and 
all  his  sons  and  cattle/ 

(Yama,  returning  to  his  house  after  an  absence 
of  three  nights,  during  which  time  Na&iketas  had 
received  no  hospitality  from  him,  says  :) 

9.  '  0  Brahma?ia,  as  thou,  a  venerable  guest,  hast 
dwelt   in  my    house  three    nights  without   eating, 
therefore  choose  now  three  boons.     Hail  to  thee ! 
and  welfare  to  me  !' 

10.  Na&iketas  said  :  '  0  Death,  as  the  first  of  the 
three  boons  I  choose  that  Gautama,  my  father,  be 
pacified,  kind,  and  free  from  anger  towards  me  ;  and 
that  he  may  know  me  and  greet  me,  when  I  shall 
have  been  dismissed  by  thee.' 

1 1.  Yama  said :  '  With  my  leave,  Auddalaki  Arum, 
thy  father,  will  know  thee,  and  be  again  towards 
thee  as  he  was  before.     He   shall  sleep  peacefully 
through  the  night,  and  free  from  anger,  after  having 
seen  thee  freed  from  the  jaws  of  death.' 

12.  Na£iketas  said:  'In  the  heaven-world  there 
is  no  fear  ;  thou  art  not  there,  0  Death,  and  no  one 
is  afraid  on    account   of  old  age.     Leaving  behind 
both    hunger   and   thirst,  and   out   of  the   reach   of 
sorrow,  all  rejoice  in  the  world  of  heaven.' 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.        173 

IT,.  'Thou  knowest,  O  Death,  the  fire-sacrifice 
which  leads  us  to  heaven  ;  tell  it  to  me,  for  I  am 
full  of  faith.  Those  who  live  in  the  heaven-world 
reach  immortality, — this  I  ask  as  my  second  boon/ 

14.  Yama  said :  '  I  will  tell  it  thee,  learn  it  from 
me,  and  when  thou  understandest  that  fire-sacrifice 
which  leads  to  heaven,  know,  0  Na&iketas,  that  it 
is  the  attainment  of  the  eternal  worlds,  and  their 
firm  support,  hidden  in  darkness.' 

15.  Yama  then  told  him  that  fire-sacrifice,  in  the 
beginning  of  the  worlds,  and  what  bricks  are  re- 
quired for  the  altar,  and  how  many,  and  how  they 
are  to  be  placed.     And  Na&iketas  repeated  all  as  it 
had  been  told  to  him.     Then  M?^'tyu,  being  pleased 
with  him,  said  again : 

1 9.  '  This,  0  Na&iketas,  is  thy  fire  which  leads  to 
heaven,  and  which  thou  hast  chosen  as  thy  second 
boon.     That  fire   all   men  will    proclaim    as  thine. 
Choose  now,  0  Na&iketas,  thy  third  boon/ 

20.  Na&iketas  said  :  '  There  is  that  doubt,  when  a 
man  is  dead, — some  saying,  he  is  ;  others,  he  is  not. 
This  I  should  like  to  know,  taught  by  thee  ;  this  is 
the  third  of  my  boons/ 

2 1 .  Death  said  :    '  On  this  point  even  the  gods 
have    been    in    doubt   formerly ;    it   is   not   easy  to 
understand.     That   subject    is  subtle.     Choose   an- 
other boon,  O  Na/dketas,  do  not  press  me,  and  let 
me  off  that  boon/ 

22.  NaAiketas    said  :     '  On    this   point    even    the 
gods  have  been  in  doubt  indeed,  and  thou,  Death, 
hast  declared  it  to  be  not  easy  to  understand,  and 
another  teacher  like  thee   is  not   to   be    found : — 
surely  no  other  boon  is  like  unto  this/ 

23.  Death  said  :  'Choose  sons  and  grandsons  who 


174  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

shall  live  a  hundred  years,  herds  of  cattle,  elephants, 
gold,  and  horses.  Choose  the  wide  abode  of  the 
earth,  and  live  thyself  as  many  harvests  as  thou 
desirest.' 

24.  '  If  thou  canst  think  of  any  boon  equal  to  that, 
choose  wealth,  and  long  life.     Be  (king),  Na&iketas, 
on  the  wide  earth.     I  make  thee  the  enjoyer  of  all 
desires.' 

25.  '  Whatever  desires  are  difficult  to  attain  among 
mortals,  ask  for  them  according  to  thy  wish  ; — these 
fair  maidens  with  their  chariots  and  musical  instru- 
ments,— such   are    indeed   not    to   be    obtained   by 
men, — be  waited  on  by  them  whom  I  give  to  thee, 
but  do  not  ask  me  about  dying.' 

26.  NaMketas    said:    'Thoughts    of  to-morrow, 
0  Death,  wear  out  the  present  vigour  of  all  the 
senses  of  man.     Even  the  whole    of  life  is   short. 
Keep  thou  thy  horses,   keep  dance   and    song   for 
thyself/ 

27.  '  No  man  can  be  made  happy  through  wealth. 
Shall  we  have  wealth,  when  we  see  thee  1     Let  us 
live,    as    long    as    thou    rulest  ?     Only    that    boon 
(which  I  have  chosen)  is  to  be  chosen  by  me.' 

28.  '  What  mortal,   slowly   decaying   here  below, 
and  knowing,   after   having   approached  them,   the 
freedom  from  decay  enjoyed  by  the  immortals,  would 
delight  in  a  long  life,  after  he  has  pondered  on  the 
pleasures  which  arise  from  beauty  and  love?' 

29.  'No,  that  on  which  there  is  this  doubt, 0  Death, 
tell  us  what  there  is  in  that  great  Hereafter.    Na&i- 
ketas  does  not  choose  another  boon  but  that  which 
enters  into  what  is  hidden.' 


FUNDAMENTAL  DOCTRINES  OP  THE  VEDANTA.     175 

SECOND  VALLI. 

1.  Death  said:  'The  good  is  one  thing,  the  pleasant 
another ;  these  two,  having  different  objects,  chain 
a  man.     It  is  well  with  him  who  clings  to  the  good  ; 
he  who  chooses  the  pleasant,  misses  his  end.' 

2.  '  The  good  and  the  pleasant  approach   man : 
the  wise  goes  round  about  them  and  distinguishes 
them.     Yea,    the   wise    prefers    the    good    to    the 
pleasant,  but  the  fool  chooses  the  pleasant  through 
greed  and  avarice.' 

3.  '  Thou,  O  Na&iketas,  after  pondering  all  plea- 
sures that  are   or  seem   delightful,  hast   dismissed 
them  all.     Thou  hast  not  gone  into  the  road  that 
leadeth  to  wealth,  in  which  many  men  perish.' 

4.  'Wide  apart  and  leading  to  different  points  are 
these  two,  ignorance,  and  what  is  known  as  wisdom. 
I  believe   Na&iketas  to  be  one  who  desires  know- 
ledge, for  even  many  pleasures  did   not   tear  thee 
away.' 

5.  '  Fools  dwelling  in  darkness,  wise  in  their  own 
conceit,   and    puffed   up  with    vain    knowledge,   go 
round  and  round,  staggering  to  and  fro,  like  blind 
men  led  by  the  blind.' 

6.  '  The  Hereafter  never  rises  before  the  eyes  of 
the  careless  child,  deluded  by  the  delusion  of  wealth. 
"This  is  the  world,"  he  thinks,  "there  is  no  other;" — 
thus  he  falls  again  and  again  under  my  sway.' 

7.  '  He  (the  Self)  of  whom  many  are  not  even  able 
to  hear,  whom  many,  even  when  they  hear  of  him, 
do  not  comprehend  ;  wonderful  is  a  man,  when  found, 
who  is  able  to  teach  this  (the  Self)  ;  wonderful  is 
he  who  comprehends  this,  when  taught  by  an  able 
teacher.' 


176  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

9.  '  That  doctrine  is  not  to  be  obtained  by  argu- 
ment, but  when  it  is  declared  by  another,  then,  O 
dearest,  it  is  easy  to  understand.  Thou  hast  obtained 
it  now  ;  thou  art  truly  a  man  of  true  resolve.  May 
we  have  always  an  inquirer  like  thee  ! ' 

i  o.  Na&iketas  said  :  '  I  know  that  what  is  called 
treasure  is  transient,  for  the  eternal  is  not  obtained 
by  things  which  are  not  eternal.  Hence  the  Na&i- 
keta  fire-sacrifice  has  been  laid  by  me  first ;  then, 
by  means  of  transient  things,  I  have  obtained  what 
is  not  transient  (the  teaching  of  Yama).' 

1 1 .  Yama  said :    '  Though  thou   hadst   seen    the 
fulfilment  of  all  desires,  the  foundation  of  the  world, 
the  endless  rewards  of  good  deeds,  the  shore  where 
there  is  no  fear,  that  which  is  magnified  by  praise, 
the  wide  abode,  the  rest,  yet  being  wise  thou  hast 
with  firm  resolve  dismissed  it  all.' 

12.  '  The  wise  who,  by  means  of  meditation  on  his 
Self,  recognises  the  Ancient,  who  is  difficult  to  be 
seen,  who  has  entered  into  darkness,  who  is  hidden 
in  the  cave,  who  dwells  in  the   abyss,  as  God,  he 
indeed  leaves  joy  and  sorrow  far  behind.' 

13.  'A  mortal  who  has  heard  this  and  embraced 
it,  who  has  removed  from  it  all  qualities,  and  has 
thus  reached  that  subtle  Being,  rejoices,  because  he 
has   obtained   what   is   a   cause    for   rejoicing.     The 
house  (of  Brahman)  is  open,  I  believe,  O  Na/dketas.' 

1 8.  'The  knowing  Self  is  not  born,  it  dies  not; 
it  sprang  from  nothing,  nothing  sprang  from  it.     The 
Ancient   is  unborn,  eternal,  everlasting ;    he  is  not 
killed,  though  the  body  is  killed.' 

19.  '  If  the  killer  thinks  that  he  kills,  if  the  killed 
thinks  that  he  is  killed,  they  do  not  understand  ;  for 
this  one  does  not  kill,  nor  is  that  one  killed.' 


FUNDAMENTAL    DOCTRINES    OF    THE    VEDANTA.       177 

20.  '  The  Self,  smaller  than  small,  greater  than 
great,  is  hidden  in  the  heart  of  the  creature.     A 
man  who  is  free  from  desires  and  free  from  grief,  sees 
the  majesty  of  the  Self  by  the  grace  of  the  Creator 
(or  through  the  serenity  of  the  elements).' 

21.  '  Though  sitting  still,  he  walks  far  ;    though 
lying    down,     he    goes    everywhere.       Who,     save 
myself,    is    able   to    know   that    God,  who  rejoices 
and  rejoices  not  ? ' 

22.  'The  wise  who  knows  the   Self  as  bodiless 
within  the  bodies,  as  unchanging  among  changing 
things,  as  great  and  omnipresent,  he  never  grieves.' 

23.  'That  Self  cannot  be  gained  by  the  Veda, 
nor  by  understanding,  nor  by  much  learning.     He 
whom  the   Self  chooses,    by  him  the   Self  can  be 
gained.      The    Self  chooses  him  (his   body)   as  his 
own.' 

24.  '  But  he  who  has  not  first  turned  away  from 
his  wickedness,  who  is  not  tranquil,  and  subdued, 
or  whose  mind  is  not  at  rest,  he  can  never  obtain 
the  Self  (even)  by  knowledge.' 

THIRD  VALLI. 

1 .  '  There  are  the  two,  drinking  their  reward  in 

O 

the  world  of  their  own  works,  entered  into  the  cave 
(of  the  heart),  dwelling  on  the  highest  summit  (the 
ether  in  the  heart).  Those  who  know  Brahman  call 
them  shade  and  light ;  likewise,  those  householders 
who  perform  the  Tri?ia/dketa  sacrifice.' 

2.  'May  we  be  able  to  master  that  Na/t'iketa  rite 
which    is    a    bridge    for    sacrificers ;     which    is    the 
highest,  imperishable  Brahman  for  those  who  wish 
to  cross  over  to  the  fearless  shore.' 

3.  '  Know  the  Self  to  be  sitting  in  the  chariot. 

x 


178  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  body  to  be  the  chariot,  the  intellect  (buddhi) 
the  charioteer,  and  the  mind  the  reins.' 

4.  '  The  senses  they  call  the  horses,  the  objects  of 
the  senses  their  roads.    When  he  (the  Highest  Self) 
is  in  union  with  the  body,  the  senses,  and  the  mind, 
then  wise  people  call  him  the  Enjoyer.' 

5.  '  He  who  has  no  understanding  and  whose  mind 
(the  reins)  is  never  firmly  held,  his  senses  (horses)  are 
unmanageable,  like  vicious  horses  of  a  charioteer.' 

O  ' 

6.  'But  he  who  has  understanding  and  whose  mind 
is  always  firmly  held,  his  senses  are  under  control, 
like  good  horses  of  a  charioteer.' 

7.  '  He  who  has  no  understanding,  who  is  unmind- 
ful and  always  impure,  never  reaches  that  place,  but 
enters  into  the  round  of  births.' 

8.  '  But  he  who  has  understanding,  who  is  mindful 
and  always  pure,   reaches  indeed  that   place,   from 
whence  he  is  not  born  again.' 

9.  '  But   he  who   has  understanding  for  his  cha- 
rioteer, and  who   holds  the  reins   of  the   mind,  he 
reaches  the  end  of  his  journey,   and  that   is   the 
highest  place  (step)  of  Vishmi.' 

10.  'Beyond   the    senses    there    are    the    objects, 
beyond  the  objects  there  is  the  mind,  beyond  the 
mind  there  is  the  intellect,  the  Great  Self  is  beyond 
the  intellect.' 

ii.'  Beyond  the  Great  there  is  the  Undeveloped, 
beyond  the  Undeveloped  there  is  the  Person 
(Purusha).  Beyond  the  Person  there  is  nothing — 
this  is  the  goal,  the  furthest  road.' 

i  2.  '  That  Self  is  hidden  in  all  beings  and  does  not 
shine  forth,  but  it  is  seen  by  subtle  seers  through 
their  sharp  and  subtle;  intellect.' 

13.   'A  wise  man  should  keep  down  speech  and 


TRANSLATION    OF    THE    UPANISHADS.  179 

mind  ;  he  should  keep  them  within  the  Self  which 
is  knowledge  ;  he  should  keep  knowledge  within  the 
Self  which  is  the  Great ;  and  he  should  keep  that 
(the  Great)  within  the  Self  wThich  is  the  Quiet/ 

14.  'Rise,  awake  I    having  obtained  your  boons, 
understand  them  !     The   sharp  edge  of  a  razor  is 
difficult  to  pass  over ;  difficult  is  the  path  (to  the 
Self) ;  the  wise  tell  it.' 

15.  '  He  who  has  perceived  that  which  is  without 
sound,  without  touch,  without  form,  without  decay, 
without  taste,  eternal,  without  smell,  without  begin- 
ning, without  end,  beyond  the  Great,  and  unchange- 
able, is  freed  from  the  jaws  of  death.' 

Translation  of  the  Upanishads. 

May  I  be  allowed  to  say  here  a  few  words  with 
regard  to  my  translation.  Those  who  know  my  trans- 
lation of  the  Upanishads,  published  in  1879  and  1884, 
will  easily  see  that  I  have  altered  it  in  several  places. 
But  I  do  not  wish  it  to  be  understood  that  I  consider 
my  translation  even  now  as  quite  free  from  doubt. 
Our  best  scholars  know  how  far  we  are  still 
from  a  perfect  understanding  of  the  Upanishads. 
When  therefore,  in  1879,  I  undertook  a  translation 
of  all  the  more  important  Upanishads,  all  I  could 
hope  for  was  to  give  a  better  translation  than  what 
we  had  before.  Though  I  was  well  aware  of  the 
difficulties  of  such  an  undertaking,  I  knew  that  I 
could  count  on  the  same  indulgence  which  is  always 
granted  to  a  first  attempt  at  translating,  nay,  often, 
as  in  our  case,  at  guessing  and  deciphering  an  ancient 
text.  Nor  have  I  been  at  all  convinced  that  I  was 
wrong  in  following  a  text,  such  as  it  is  presupposed 
by  the  commentaries  of  /Samkara,  instead  of  intro- 

N  2 


l8o  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ducing  conjectural  emendations,  however  obvious 
they  seem  to  be.  Scholars  should  learn  that  the 
more  obvious  their  emendations  are,  the  more 
difficult  it  becomes  to  account  for  the  introduction 
of  such  palpable  corruptions  into  an  ancient  text, 
such  as  it  was  at  the  time  of  $a??ikara.  My 
determination  also,  whenever  it  was  impossible  to 
discover  a  satisfactory  meaning,  to  be  satisfied 
with  /Sawkara's  interpretations,  who  after  all  lived 
a  thousand  years  ago,  may  be  criticised,  and  I  never 
represented  it  as  more  than  a  pis  aller.  Besides 
that,  all  the  translators  of  the  S.  B.  E.  had  to  make 
a  sacrifice  in  giving  what  they  could  give  at  the 
time,  without  waiting  for  the  ninth  year.  Though 
I  have  hardly  ever  referred  to  the  mistakes  made 
by  earlier  translators  of  the  Upanishads,  but  have 
simply  corrected  them,  anybody  who  will  take  the 
trouble  to  compare  them  with  my  own  will  find 
a  good  harvest  of  them,  as  those  who  come  after 
me  will  no  doubt  glean  many  a  stray  ear  even  in 
a  field  which  so  many  mowers  have  mowed.  But 
the  work  of  the  children  that  glean  some  ears  is  very 
different  from  that  of  the  mower  who  has  to  mow 
a  whole  field  alone.  Such  a  work  as  Colonel  Jacob's 
Concordance  of  the  Principal  Upanishads  and  the 
Bhagavad-gita,  published  in  1891,  has  placed  at  the 
disposal  of  all  Vedantic  students  what  may  almost 
be  called  a  mowing  machine  in  place  of  a  sickle  ;  and 
the  careful  and  brilliant  translation  of  the  Sixty 
Upanishads  published  by  Professor  Deussen,  in  1897, 
shows  what  an  immense  advance  has  been  made 
with  its  help.  I  have  adopted  many  emendations  in 
the  extracts  given  above,  from  Professor  Deussen's 
work,  and  when  my  translations  diller  from  his, 


TRANSLATION    OF    THE    UPANISHADS.  l8l 

all  I  can  say  is  that  I  always  differ  most  reluctantly 
from  one  who  has  devoted  so  many  years  to 
Vedantic  studies,  and  whose  mind  is  so  thoroughly 
imbued  with  Vedantic  ideas.  If  we  could  always 
know  at  what  time  each  Upanishad  was  finally 
settled  and  reduced  to  writing,  whether  before  or 
after  the  time  when  the  Vedarita  and  Samkhya- 
philosophy  assumed  each  its  own  independent  and 
systematic  form,  our  task  would  be  much  lightened. 
Whenever  we  come  across  such  words  as  Atman  and 
Brahman  we  suspect  Vedantic  influences,  whereas 
Purusha  and  PrakHti  at  once  remind  us  of  Sawkhya 
doctrines.  But  Atman  is  by  no  means  unknown  to 
early  Samkhya  philosophers,  nor  is  Purusha  entirely 
outside  the  Vedantic  horizon.  To  say,  therefore, 
that  Purusha  must  always  be  taken  in  the  technical 
Samkhya  sense,  and  Atman  in  that  of  the  Vedanta, 
is  going  too  far,  at  least  at  present.  We  go  still 
further  out  of  our  depth  if  we  maintain,  with  regard 
to  the  Ka^Aa  Upanishad,  for  instance,  that  there 
was  a  time  when  it  consisted  of  one  chapter  and 
three  Vallis  only.  It  may  have  been  so,  and  who 
shall  prove  that  it  was  not  so  ?  But  on  the  other 
hand,  what  do  we  know  of  the  compilers  of  the 
Upanishads  to  enable  us  to  speak  so  positively 
on  such  a  subject  ?  Everybody  can  see  that  there 
was  a  division  at  III,  13,  or  16,  or  17.  The  technical 
repetition  of  certain  words  in  IV,  1 7  might  indicate 
that  the  Upanishad  originally  ended  there,  and  that 
V,  1 8  is  later.  Anybody  can  see  also  that  the 
second  Adhyaya  differs  in  spirit  from  the  first. 
The  name  of  Na£iketas,  for  instance,  is  never 
mentioned  in  the  second  chapter,  except  in  the 
last  and  probably  spurious  or  additional  verse, 


1 82  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  then  it  appears  as  NaAiketa,  as  derived  from 
Na&iketa,  not  from  the  old  form  NaHketas.  We 
may  easily  discover  a  different  spirit  in  the  third, 
as  compared  with  the  first  and  second  Valli.  In 
fact,  there  is  still  plenty  of  work  left  for  those 
who  come,  after  us,  for  with  all  that  has  been 
achieved  we  are  on  the  threshold  only  of  a  truly 
historical  study  of  Indian  philosophy  and  literature. 
Here,  also,  we  are  still  like  children  playing  on 
the  sea-shore  and  finding  now  and  then  a  pebble  or 
a  shell,  whilst  the  great  ocean  of  that  ancient  litera- 
ture lies  before  us  undiscovered  and  unexplored. 

Character  of  the  Upanishads. 

Such  utterances  as  I  have  here  quoted  from  the 
Upanishads  will  hardly  seem  worthy  of  the  name  of 
philosophy.  It  would  have  been  almost  impossible 
to  describe  them  so  as  to  give  a  clear  idea  of  what 
the  Upanishads  really  are.  With  us  philosophy 
always  means  something  systematic,  while  what  we 
find  here  are  philosophic  rhapsodies  rather  than 
consecutive  treatises.  But  that  is  the  very  reason 
why  the  Upanishads  are  so  interesting  to  the  his- 
torical student.  Nowhere,  except  in  India,  can  we 
watch  that  period  of  chaotic  thought,  half  poetical, 
half  religious,  which  preceded,  in  India  at  least,  the 
age  of  pbilosophy,  properly  so  called.  Possibly,  if 
we  knew  more  of  the  utterances  of  such  men  as 
Heraclitus  or  Epimenides  in  Greece,  they  might 
show  some  likeness  to  the  outpourings  of  the  authors 
of  the  Upanishads.  What  is  quite  clear,  however, 
is  that  the  systematic  philosophy  of  India  would  be 
perfectly  unintelligible  without  the  previous  chapter 
of  the  Upanishads.  And  however  unsystematic 


CHARACTER    OF    THE    UPANISHADS.  183 

these  relics  of  the  childhood  of  philosophy  may 
seem,  there  is  really  more  system  in  them  than 
appears  at  first  sight.  They  contain  a  number  even 
of  technical  terms  which  show  that  the  Upanishads 
did  not  spring  up  in  one  day,  and  that  there  must 
have  been  a  good  deal  of  philosophical  controversy 
during  the  age  that  is  recorded  to  us  in  the  Upani- 
shads. If  /SVetaketu  is  represented  as  attending  the 
schools  of  famous  teachers  till  he  is  twenty-four 
years  of  age,  and  is  then  only  learning  from  his 
father  the  highest  wisdom,  we  see  that  that  highest 
wisdom  had  already  been  fully  elaborated  in  the 
formula  of '  Tattvam  asi,'  '  Thou  art  that,'  that  is,  thou, 
man,  art  not  different  from  that  divine  nature  which 
pervades  the  whole  world,  as  salt  pervades  the  sea. 
You  cannot  see  it,  you  cannot  handle  it,  but  you  can 
taste  it  and  know  that,  though  invisible,  it  is  there. 
That  divine  essence,  that  which  is  alone  true  and  real 
in  this  unreal  or  phenomenal  world,  is  present  likewise, 
though  invisible,  as  the  germ  of  life  in  the  smallest 
seed,  and  without  it  there  would  be  no  seed,  no 
fruit,  no  tree,  as  without  God  there  would  be  no 
world.  That  this  ancient  wisdom  should  be  so 
often  mixed  up  with  what  seems  to  us  childish  and 
absurd,  is  as  true  as  it  is  difficult  to  explain,  but 
we  must  remember  that  a  long  continued  oral 
tradition  must  naturally  leave  a  wide  door  open  to 
additions  of  every  kind. 

Whatever  we  may  think  of  these  Upanishads, 
it  cannot  be  doubted  that  they  represent  the  soil 
which  contained  the  seeds  of  philosophy  which 
sprang  up  and  had  their  full  growth  in  the  great 
systems  of  philosophy  of  a  later  age. 


184  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Ve  cUinta-  S  fttras . 

If  now  we  turn  to  these,  and  first  of  all,  to  the 
philosophy  elaborated  by  Badaraya/ia,  we  find  no 
longer  rhapsodies,  but  a  carefully  reasoned  system, 
contained  in  555  short  paragraphs,  the  so-called 
Vedanta-Sutras.  We  read  there  in  the  first  Sutra 
and  as  a  kind  of  title,  '  Now  then  a  desire  to  know 
Brahman,'  or  as  Deussen  translates  Giyn&sh,  'Now 
then  research  of  Brahman.'  The  two  words  Atha  and 
AtaA  which,  I  believe,  were  originally  no  more  than 
introductory,  and  which  occur  again  and  again  at 
the  beginning  of  Sanskrit  works,  always  give  rise 
to  endless  and  most  fanciful  interpretations.  If  we 
must  assign  to  them  any  special  meaning,  it  seems 
to  me  best  to  take  Atha  in  the  sense  of  Now,  and 
Ata/z-  in  the  sense  of  Then  or  Therefore,  implying 
thereby  that  the  student  has  fulfilled  certain  pre- 
liminary conditions,  such  as  Upanayana,  reception 
by  a  teacher,  Vedadhyayana,  learning  by  heart  the 
text  of  the  Veda,  including  the  Upanishads,  and 
that  he  is  therefore  likely  to  feel  a  desire  to  under- 
stand the  Veda  and  to  know  Brahman.  It  may 
be  true  also,  as  some  commentators  maintain,  that 
in  real  life  the  first  step  would  have  been  to  study 
the  Purva-Mimamsa,  or  what  is  called  Dharma,  law, 
virtue,  &c.  ;  and  that  only  after  having  gained  a 
knowledge  of  Dharma,  particularly  of  the  sacrificial 
Dharma,  would  there  arise  a  desire  to  know  Brah- 
man. In  that  case  the  Mimamsd  might  be  looked 
upon  as  one  body,  the  Purva-Mimawsa  forming  the 
first,  the  Uttara-Miinib/isa  the  second  part,  and  we 
should  have  to  consider  the  practice  of  virtue  and 
the  performance  of  sacrificial  acts  as  a  necessary 


VEDANTA-S^TRAS.  185 

preliminary  to  a  study  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy, 
or,  as  it  is  generally  expressed,  we  should  have  to 
consider  works  as  essential  for  producing  that  purity 
and  serenity  of  the  mind  without  which  a  know- 
ledge of  Brahman  is  impossible.  I  confess  I  doubt 
whether  all  this  was  present  to  the  mind  of  Biida- 
raya?ia.  He  may  have  used  Gign&sa,,  wish  to  know, 
instead  of  ViMra,  research  or  discussion,  on  purpose, 
because  in  the  true  sense  Brahman  cannot  be  de- 
fined or  known.  But  although  Brahman  cannot 
be  known  like  all  other  things,  by  being  defined 
as  So  and  So,  it  can  be  explained  negatively  as 
Not  so  and  Not  so,  and  can  thus  be  cleared  from 
many  doubts  which  arise  from  the  various  utterances 
about  it  in  the  Upanishads.  When  we  read,  how- 
ever, that  food  is  Brahman  l,  that  Manas  is  Brah- 
man -,  that  Vi^fiana  is  Brahman 3,  that  the  sun  is 
Brahman 4,  nay  that  Narayana  is  Brahman 5,  there 
is  surely  room  enough  for  trying  to  determine  what 
Brahman  really  is,  or  at  least  what  he  or  it  was 
to  Badarayana  and  his  predecessors. 

The  best  answer,  however,  to  all  these  questions 
is  that  given  in  the  next  Sutra,  '  That  from  which 
the  origin  &c.  (origin,  subsistence,  and  dissolution) 
of  this  world  proceed 6.'  The  full  sense  of  this 
Sutra,  according  to  the  commentator,  is :  '  That 

1  JDmnd.  Up.  VII,  7,  9,  2  ;  Brih.  Ar.  V,  12,  i. 

2  Khaud.  Up.  Ill,  18,  i  ;  VII,  3,  2  ;  Brill.  Ar.  IV,  i,  6. 

3  JOand.  Up.  VII,  7,  2. 

4  J^and.  Up.  Ill,  19,  i ;  Brill.  Up.  II,  i,  2. 

5  Mahanar.  Up.  XI,  4. 

6  The  words  which  actually  occur  in  the  Sutra  are  printed 
in  italics,  to  give  an  idea  of  the  enigmatical  style  of  the  Sutras, 
and  their  utter  uselessness  without  a  commentary. 


1 86  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

omniscient,  omnipotent  cause  from  which  proceed 
the  origin,  subsistence  and  dissolution  of  the  world, 
which  world  is  differentiated  by  names  and  forms, 
contains  many  agents  and  enjoyers,  and  is  the 
abode  of  fruits  or  effects,  caused  by  former  actions, 
these  fruits  having  their  definite  places,  times  and 
causes,  and  the  nature  of  whose  arrangement  cannot 
be  conceived  by  the  mind — that  cause  is  Brahman. 

If  it  be  asked,  how  this  is  known,  the  commen- 
tator insists  very  strongly  that  such  knowledge  is 
not  to  be  gained  by  sense  perception  or  by  inference, 
but  simply  by  the  Veda  (Upanishads),  passages  of 
which  have  been  collected  and  properly  arranged 
in  the  Sutras.  If  in  some  places  he  admits  as  a 
second  source  of  knowledge  Sakshatkara,  or  mani- 
festation, that  can  only  be  meant  for  intuition, 
but,  strictly  speaking,  such  intuition  also  presup- 
poses a  previous  working  of  the  organs  of  sensuous 
perception,  while  the  object  of  such  Sakshatkara, 
i.  e.  Brahman,  can  at  first  be  supplied  by  the  Veda 
only.  In  support  therefore  of  our  Sutra  which  is 
intended  to  give  a  general  idea  of  Brahman,  a 
passage  is  quoted  from  the  Taitt.  Up.  Ill,  i,  where 
Varu^a  explains  to  his  son  that  '  that  from  which 
these  beings  are  born,  that  by  which,  when  born, 
they  live,  that  into  which  at  their  death  they 
re-enter,  try  to  know  that,  that  is  Brahman.' 

Appeals  to  the  Veda. 

And  here  we  should  mark  a  curious  feature  of 
orthodox  Indian  philosophy.  Though  the  Vedanta 
appeals  to  the  Veda,  it  appeals  to  it,  not  as  having 
itself  grown  out  of  it  or  as  belonging  to  it,  but 
rather  as  an  independent  witness,  looking  back  to  it 


PRAMAJVAS.  187 

for  sanction  and  confirmation.  The  same  applies, 
though  in  a  less  degree,  to  other  systems  also. 
They  all  speak  as  if  they  had  for  several  generations 
elaborated  their  doctrines  independently,  and,  after 
they  had  done  so,  they  seem  to  come  back  to  get 
the  approval  of  the  Veda,  or  to  establish  their 
conformity  with  the  Veda,  as  the  recognised  highest 
authority.  This  shows  that  a  certain  time  must 
have  elapsed  after  the  final  redaction  of  the  Upani- 
shads  and  the  return,  as  it  were,  of  their  offspring, 
the  Sutras,  to  their  original  home.  How  this  came 
about,  we  cannot  tell,  because  we  have  no  historical 
documents,  but  that  there  had  been  something  very 
important  intervening  between  the  old  Upanishads 
and  the  first  attempts  at  systematising  Vedanta 
and  Samkhya  doctrines  in  the  form  of  Sutras  is 
very  clear  by  the  manner  in  which  the  Sutras 
appeal  to  the  Veda.  This  constant  appeal  to  the 
Veda  as  the  highest  authority  was  justified  by  the 
most  elaborate  arguments,  as  part  of  the  question, 
How  do  we  know  ?  a  question  which  forms  an  essen- 
tial preliminary  to  all  philosophy  in  India. 

Pramawas. 

We  saw  how  the  .Sfarvakas  admitted  but  one 
source  of  knowledge,  the  evidence  of  the  senses, 
excluding  all  others.  How  they  defended  that 
sensuous  knowledge  against  the  uncertainties  in- 
herent in  it,  we  do  not  know,  because  we  do  not 
possess  those  Sutras.  But  it  is  characteristic  of 
the  Vedanta-Sutras,  that  they  pay  much  smaller 
attention  to  the  Prama/ias,  the  sources  and  autho- 
rities of  knowledge,  than  the  other  systems.  These 
questions  of  Pramawa  are  often  referred  to  in  the 


l88  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

commentaries,  but  not  so  much  in  the  text.  Prama»ia 
is  originally  the  instrument  of  measuring,  from  Ma, 
to  measure,  and  Pra,  forth.  It  may  be  translated 
by  measure,  standard,  authority,  and  survives  in 
the  modern  Persian  Ferman,  an  authoritative 
order. 

Pramanas  according  to  the  Sawikhya. 

The  Pramana  which  serves  as  a  means  (Sadhana) 
of  determining,  produces  Pramiti,  accurate  know- 
ledge, just  as  a  Sadhana  (means)  produces  Siddhi, 
truth  or  certainty.  When  we  come  to  the  Sawikhya, 
we  shall  find  there  a  very  full  and  perhaps  the  oldest 
description  of  the  three  essential  Pram&nas,  viz. 
Pratyaksha,  Anumana,  and  /Sabda.  The  first  Pra- 
ma?ia,  Pratyaksha,  is  what  we  mean  by  sensuous 
perception,  though  it  is  also  used  in  the  sense  of 
what  can  be  perceived  by  the  senses,  the  Dn'shte, 
i.e.  what  is  seen.  It  is  explained  (Sawkhya-Sutra 
I,  89)  as  cognition  which  arises  from  contact  (with 
objects)  and  represents  their  form. 

Pratyaksha. 

It  is  generally  explained  by  Indriyartha-sa?mii- 
karsha,  contact  of  the  senses  and  their  respective 
objects,  and  is  said  to  involve  really  three  stages, 
contact  of  the  sense-organ  with  its  object,  and  at 
the  same  time  union  of  the  sense  with  Manas, 
mind,  and  union  of  Manas,  mind,  with  Atman,  Self. 
There  is  a  distinction  made  between  two  kinds  of 
Pratyaksha,  called  Savikalpa  and  Nirvikalpa,  with 
doubt  and  without  doubt.  The  former  seems  to 
consist  in  our  seeing  an  object,  and  then  declaring 
that  it  is  this  or  that ;  the  latter  in  simply  accepting 


ANUMANA.  189 

a  thing  such  as  it  is,  without  any  previous  idea  of 
it,  such  as  when  we  awake  from  sleep,  see  a  tiger, 
and  at  once  run  away.  Each  sense  working  by 
itself,  and  on  its  own  objects  only,  is  the  Asadha- 
rawakararia,  the  special  or  exclusive  instrument  of 
the  knowledge  conveyed  by  it.  Sound,  for  instance, 
is  heard  by  the  ear  only,  and  is  conveyed  by  Akasa 
or  ether.  But  not  every  sound  is  brought  into 
immediate  contact  with  the  ear ;  it  is  transmitted 
through  the  ether,  as  we  are  told,  by  means  of 
waves  (ViAita),  so  that  we  may  perceive  the  beating 
of  a  distant  drum,  one  wave  propelling  the  other 
across  the  vast  ocean  of  ether,  till  it  strikes  the 
shore,  i.  e.  the  ear. 

Anumana. 

The  next  Prama^a  is  Anumana  or  inference,  which 
is  explained  (1.  c.,  I,  100)  as  knowledge  of  the  con- 
nected on  the  part  of  one  who  knows  the  connection, 
or  as  knowledge  of  something  that  is  not  perceptible, 
but  is  known  as  being  invariably  connected  (Vyapya) 
with  something  else  that  is  perceived,  as  when 
we  perceive  fire  (Vyapaka)  from  perceiving  smoke 
(Vyapta).  This  is  a  very  imperfect  description  of 
Anumana,  wThich  will  be  more  fully  explained  here- 
after, but  it  suffices  for  our  present  purpose.  As 
an  illustration,  we  have  the  common  illustration 
that  we  know  the  presence  of  fire  when  we  see 
smoke,  and  that  we  know  the  absence  of  smoke 
when  we  see  no  fire,  always  supposing  that  fire 
has  been  proved  to  be  the  Vyapaka  or  the  sine 
qua  non  of  smoke. 


INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 


Sabda. 

$abda  (I,  101)  or  word,  another  Pramana,  is  ex- 
plained to  be  instruction  given  by  one  that  can  be 
trusted  (Aptopadesa)  ;  this  one  that  can  be  trusted 
being  for  the  Vedantists  the  Veda,  but  for  the 
Samkhya  and  other  systems,  any  other  person  also 
endowed  with  authority  and  therefore  considered 
as  trustworthy.  It  might  easily  be  shown  that 
these  three  Pramanas  all  go  back  to  one,  the 
Pratyaksha,  because  the  invariable  concomitance 
between  smoke  and  fire  and  the  like,  on  which  the 
Anumana  rests,  can  have  been  established  by  sen- 
suous experience  only  ;  and  the  trustworthiness  of 
any  knowledge  conveyed  by  word  must  equally 
depend  on  experience,  or  on  acquaintance  with 
the  person  who  is  or  is  not  to  be  trusted. 

The  question  is,  whether  this  $abda,  word,  was 
originally  taken  to  signify  the  Veda  such  as  we 
possess  it  T.  I  have  elsewhere  given  my  reasons 
for  believing  that  /S'abda  had  really  a  far  more 
general  and  more  philosophical  meaning,  and  that 
it  may  have  been  intended  at  first  for  Brahman, 
the  Word,  or  for  verbal  knowledge  as  is  conveyed 
by  a  word.  The  Hindus  knew  quite  well  that 
words  such  as  greatness,  goodness,  nay,  also  such 
as  animal,  plant,  metal,  nay,  even  dog  or  cow, 
convey  knowledge  that  cannot  be  gained  either  by 
perception  or  by  inference  alone,  but  only  by  the 
word.  The  same  applies  to  Aptava&ana,  another 


1  Samkhya-Philosophie,  p.  154,  Anin.  ,3.  That  the  connec- 
tion between  sound  and  meaning,  and  therefore  the  authority 
of  words  by  themselves,  occupied  the  Sawkhyas,  we  see  from 
Sutra  V,  37. 


SABDA. 


term  for  $abda,  word,  used  in  the  Samkhya-philo- 
sophy.  Apta,  which  is  explained  by  Yogya,  can 
hardly  be  translated  by  aptus.  It  means  what 
has  been  obtained  or  received,  and  Aptavakya  or 
Aptava&ana  need  originally  have  meant  no  more 
than  our  traditional  language  such  as  it  is,  though 
it  was  explained  afterwards  as  meaning  the  word 
of  a  person  worthy  of  confidence,  or  even  of  a  book 
believed  in  by  the  world  at  large.  However,  we 
must  be  satisfied  with  what  the  Sa?7ikhya  philo- 
sophers tell  us  ;  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
the  followers  of  the  orthodox  Samkhya  understood 
/Sabda  in  the  sense  of  Veda  ;  though,  considering 
that  they  admitted  a  divine,  not  a  human  origin 
of  the  Veda,  it  is  difficult  to  understand  how  they 
could  afterwards  take  it  in  the  general  sense  of  the 
word  of  one  that  can  be  trusted.  The  important 
question  for  us  to  consider  is  what  other  systems 
of  philosophy  have  made  of  these  three  Pranuwas. 
The  Sutras  of  all  the  other  systems  of  philosophy 
are  well  acquainted  with  them,  and  they  are  even 
referred  to  by  the  commentators  of  the  Vedanta 
also.  It  seems  strange  at  first  sight,  considering 
that  the  question  of  the  possibility  of  knowing  or 
of  the  instruments  of  knowledge,  forms  the  founda- 
tion of  every  true  system  of  philosophy,  that  the 
Brahma-Sutras,  though  not  the  later  Vedanta  works, 
should  apparently  have  attached  so  little  importance 
to  what  may  be  called  their  Critique  of  Pure  Reason. 
This  would  seem  indeed  to  lower  the  Vedanta-philo- 
sophy  to  the  level  of  all  Pre-Kantian  philosophy, 
but  a  little  reflection  will  show  us  that  there  was 
in  the  Vedanta  a  sufficient  excuse  for  this  neglect. 
What  at  first  sight  makes  the  case  still  worse  is 


192  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

that  while  Pratyaksha,  perception,  and  Anumana, 
inference,  are  ignored,  the  only  evidence  invoked  by 
Badarayafta  is  $ruti  or  revelation,  which,  as  we  saw, 
was  often  invoked  by  the  modern  orthodox  Samkhyas 
under  the  name  of  $abda  or  word.  To  most  philo- 
sophers revelation  would  seem  a  very  weak  instru- 
ment of  knowledge,  and  one  that  could  never  claim 
more  than  a  subordinate  place,  even  if  treated  as  a 
subdivision  of  Anumana  or  inference.  But  we 
must  remember  that  it  is  the  highest  object  of  the 
Vedanta  to  prove  that  there  is  only  one  true  reality, 
namely  Brahman,  and  that  the  manifoldness  of  the 
visible  world  is  but  the  result  of  that  nescience 
which  the  Vedanta  is  meant  to  destroy.  It  will 
then  become  intelligible  why  an  appeal  to  the  evi- 
dence of  the  senses  or  to  inference  would  have  been 
out  of  place  and  almost  self-contradictory  in  the 
Vedanta.  The  commentator  admits  this  when  he 
says,  '  If  we  acquiesce  in  the  doctrine  of  absolute 
unity  (Brahman),  the  ordinary  means  of  right  know- 
ledge, perception,  &c.,  become  invalid,  because  the 
absence  of  manifoldness  deprives  them  of  their 
objects.'  Hence,  a  doctrine  which  undertakes  to 
prove  that  the  manifold  world,  presented  to  us  by 
the  senses,  is  unreal,  could  not  well  appeal  at  the 
same  time  to  the  evidence  of  the  senses,  nor  to  in- 
ference which  is  founded  on  it,  in  support  of  truth 
or  right  knowledge,  though  it  may  and  does  readily 
acknowledge  their  importance  for  all  the  ordinary 
transactions  of  life.  Thus  /Sawkara  continues  :  'So 
long  as  a  person  has  not  reached  the  true  knowledge 
of  the  unity  of  the  Self,  it  does  not  enter  his  mind 
that  the  world  bf  effects,  witli  its  instruments  and 
objects  of  right  knowledge  and  its  results  of  actions, 


SABDA.  193 

is  untrue  ;  and  hence,  as  long  as  true  knowledge 
does  not  present  itself,  there  is  no  reason  why  the 
ordinary  course  of  secular  and  religious  activity 
should  not  go  on  undisturbed.' 

How  well  B4darayawa  must  have  been  acquainted 
with  the  ordinary  evidences  of  knowledge,  both 
Pratyaksha  and  Anumttna,  is  best  shown  by  the  new 
meaning  which  he  assigns  to  them,  applying  (I,  3,  28) 
Pratyaksha  to  Srut'i  (revelation)  and  Anumana  to 
Snm'ti  (tradition),  the  Veda  being  to  him  self-evident, 
while  other  works,  such  as  the  Law-books  of  Manu, 
the  Mahabharata  (Bhagavad-gita),  nay  even  the 
Sawkhya  and  Yoga  systems  (IV,  2,21),  being  Snmti, 
are  true  in  so  far  only  as  they  are  not  in  opposition  to 
the  Veda.  But  everything  else,  every  kind  of  Tarka 
or  speculation,  is  excluded  when  the  fundamental 
truths  of  the  Vedanta  are  at  stake.  Thus  /Samkara, 
II,  i ,  n,  says  :  '  In  matters  to  be  known  from  $ruti 
mere  reasoning1  is  not  to  be  relied  on.  As  the 

o 

thoughts  of  man  are  altogether  unfettered,  reasoning, 
which  disregards  the  holy  texts  and  rests  on  in- 
dividual opinion  only,  has  no  proper  foundation.  One 
sees  how  arguments  which  some  clever  men  had 
excogitated  with  great  pains,  are  shown  by  people 
still  more  ingenious  to  be  fallacious,  and  how  the 
arguments  of  the  latter  are  refuted  in  their  turn 
by  other  men  ;  so  that  on  account  of  the  diversity  of 
men's  opinions,  it  is  impossible  to  accept  mere  reason- 
ing as  having  a  sure  foundation.  Nor  can  we  get 
over  this  difficulty  by  accepting  as  well  founded  the 
reasoning  of  some  person  of  recognised  eminence, 
whether  Kapila  or  any  one  else,  since  we  observe 
that  even  men  of  the  most  undoubted  intellectual 
eminence,  such  as  Kapila,  Kamida,  and  other  founders 

o 


INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  philosophical  schools,  have  contradicted  each 
other.' 

This  rejection  of  reason  and  reasoning,  though  not 
unfamiliar  to  ourselves,  seems  certainly  strange  in  a 
philosopher  ;  and  it  is  not  unnatural  that  $amkara 
should  have  been  taunted  by  his  adversaries  with 
using  reason  against  reasoning.  '  You  cannot,'  they 
say,  '  maintain  that  no  reasoning  whatever  is  well- 
founded,  for  you  yourself  can  found  your  assertion 
that  reasoning  has  no  foundation,  on  reasoning  only. 
Moreover,  if  all  reasoning  were  unfounded,  the  whole 
course  of  practical  human  life  would  have  to  come 
to  an  end.'  But  even  this  does  not  frighten  $amkara. 
As  all  reasoning  is  admittedly  founded  on  perception 
and  inference,  he  replies,  '  that  although  with  regard 
to  some  things  reasoning  is  known  to  be  well  founded, 
with  regard  to  the  matter  in  hand  there  will  be  no 
escape,  i.e.  reasoning  cannot  there  escape  from  the 
charge  of  being  ill-founded.  The  true  nature  of  the 
cause  of  the  world  on  which  final  emancipation  de- 
pends cannot,  on  account  of  its  excessive  abstruse- 
ness,  even  be  thought  of  without  the  help  of  the 
holy  texts  ;  for  it  cannot  become  the  object  of  per- 
ception because  it  does  not  possess  qualities  such  as 
form  and  the  like,  and,  as  it  is  devoid  of  characteristic 
signs  or  qualities,  it  cannot  lend  itself  to  inference 
and  other  means  of  right  knowledge.' 

Here  we  approach  a  very  difficult  question,  and 
have  possibly  to  admit  a  weak  link  in  the  strong 
chain  armour  of  both  Badardyana  and  £awkara. 
How  is  the  supreme  authority  of  the  Veda  to  be 
established  against  those  who  doubt  it  ?  It  may  be 
enough  for  the  orthodox  to  say  that  the  Veda  is  its 
own  proof,  that  it  is  self-luminous  like  the  sun  :  but 


THE    MEANING    OF    VEDA.  195 

how  are  objections  to  be  silenced  ?  The  Vedanta 
philosophers  have  no  superstitions  on  any  other 
points,  and  are  perfectly  fearless  in  the  treatment  of 
all  other  problems ;  they  can  enter  into  the  most 
subtle  controversies,  and  yet  they  are  satisfied  with 
the  mere  assertion  that  the  Veda  wants  no  proof, 
that  its  authority  requires  no  support  from  elsewhere 
(pram4?iyam.  nirapeksham),  that  it  is  direct  evidence 
of  truth,  just  as  the  light  of  the  sun  is  its  own  evi- 
dence of  light,  and  at  the  same  time  the  direct  means 
of  our  knowledge  of  form  and  colour  (II,  i,  i). 

Authority  of  the  Vedas. 

But  who  says  so  ?  Who  but  a  fallible  mortal  ? 
It  is  hardly  enough  if  we  were  to  say  that  the  Veda 
was  the  oldest  document  which  the  Brahmans 
possessed,  that  it  may  even  have  been  brought 
into  India  from  another  country,  that  its  very 
language  required  to  be  interpreted  by  competent 
persons.  All  this  might  have  helped  to  invest  the 
Veda  with  some  kind  of  mysterious  character  ;  but 
my  impression  has  always  been  that  this  would  be 
taking  too  low  a  view  of  the  Indian  intellect.  Veda, 
I  hold,  was  not  merely  the  name  of  a  text  or  of  texts, 
but  was  originally  conceived  in  a  far  deeper  sense. 

The  Meaning  of  Veda. 

We  often  read  that  Veda  is  Brahman,  and 
Brahman  is  Veda,  and  in  such  passages  Brahman  is 
now  generally  taken  in  the  sense  of  the  Samhitas 
and  Brahmanas  such  as  we  possess  them.  But 
might  it  not,  like  Aptava&ana,  to  which  we  referred 
before,  have  meant  originally  knowledge  or  wisdom 

o  2 


196  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

or  Sophia ;  and  as  such  a  Sophia  was  impossible 
without  words,  might  we  not  here  also  have  a 
faint  recollection  of  Brahman  as  the  Word,  the 
first  creation  of  divine  thought.  After  all,  Veda 
means  originally  knowledge,  and  not  hymns  and 
Brahma/ias,  and  as  such  would  come  very  near 
to  Wisdom  or  Sophia.  I  do  not  venture  to  speak 
positively  on  such  a  subject,  because  there  is  so 
little  of  real  evidence  left  to  which  we  could  appeal. 
I  give  it  simply  as  an  idea  that  has  presented  itself 
to  my  mind  as  a  way  out  of  many  difficulties.  To 
prevent  all  misunderstandings  I  say  at  once  that 
I  do  not  entertain  the  idea  that  such  thoughts  were 
borrowed  from  Greece  and  Alexandria,  or  had  been 
matured  during  the  as  yet  undivided  Aryan  period. 
All  I  should  venture  to  suggest  is  that  the  idea  of 
the  Word  or  the  Logos  being  the  first  revelation, 
manifestation  or  creation  of  a  Divine  Power  is  by 
no  means  so  strange,  even  in  a  very  early  period  of 
thought,  as  it  seems  to  us.  People  who  have 
thought  at  all  about  what  a  word  is,  not  a  mere 
sign  or  a  means  of  communication,  but  an  act  em- 
bodying for  the  first  time  a  definite  idea  which 
came  into  existence  by  being  uttered,  and  after- 
wards thrown  forth  and  realised  in  our  objective 
world,  would  naturally,  whether  in  Greece  or  in 
India,  recognise  in  every  word  an  act  of  a  Divine 
Thinker,  just  as  in  every  species  they  have  to  recog- 
nise the  will  of  a  Divine  Creator.  >Sawkara  goes 
so  far  as  to  declare  that  the  Veda  is  the  cause 
of  the  distinction  of  all  the  different  classes  and 
conditions  (species)  of  gods,  animals,  and  men  ( [,  i,  3, 
and  Bf'ih.  Ar.  Upari.  II,  4,  10).  Nay  he  speaks  still 
more  distinctly  in  I,  3,  28  :  '  We  all  know  from 


THE    MEANING    OF    VEDA.  197 

observation,'  he  says,  '  that  any  one,  when  setting 
about  something  which  he  wishes  to  accomplish, 
first  remembers  the  word  denoting  the  thing,  and 
after  that  sets  to  work.'  What  should  he  do  when 
there  is  as  yet  no  word  to  remember,  but  the  word, 
that  is,  the  idea,  has  first  to  be  created  ?  We  there- 
fore conclude  that,  before  the  creation,  the  Vedic 
words  became  manifest  in  the  mind  of  Pragrapati 
the  creator,  and  that  after  that  he  created  the  things 
corresponding  to  these  words.  The  Sruti  also,  when 
it  says  'uttering  Bhur  He  created  the  earth, 
&c.,'  shows  that  the  worlds,  such  as  the  earth,  &c., 
became  manifest,  i.  e.  were  created,  from  the  word 
Bhur,  which  had  become  manifest  in  the  mind  (of 
Pra^apati).  In  that  case  the  recognition  by  Indian 
thinkers  of  Brahman  as  the  Word  or  the  Divine 
Thought,  or  as  Veda,  would  by  no  means  be  so 
surprising  as  it  sounds  to  us  at  first.  It  might  then 
be  said  quite  truly  that  the  $abda,  sound,  or  Brah- 
man or  Va/v  or  *BHh  =  word,  was  eternal,  absolute, 
self-luminous,  self-evident,  in  fact  all  that  the  Veda 
is  said  to  be.  Two  such  words  as  Brahman  and 
Atman  would  by  themselves  convey  that  eternal 
truth  for  which  the  Vedanta-philosophy  is  fighting, 
and  in  support  of  which  there  is  but  one  appeal,  not 
to  sensuous  experience  nor  to  inference,  but  to  the 
Word  itself,  i.  e.  to  Brahman,  or  the  Veda.  I  know 
full  well  how  entirely  hypothetical,  if  not  mystical, 
this  may  sound  to  many  Sanskrit  scholars,  but 
I  could  not  entirely  suppress  these  thoughts,  as 
they  seem  to  me  the  only  way  in  which  we  can  free 
our  Vedanta  philosophers  from  the  charge  of  child- 
ishness, for  imagining  that  they  could  establish  the 
highest  truths  which  are  within  the  reach  of  the 


198  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

human  mind,  on  such  authorities  as  the  hymns,  the 
Brahmanas  and  even  some  of  the  Upanishads,  as  we 
possess  them  now. 

Returning  to  the  Vedanta,  however,  such  as  we 
know  it  from  the  Sutras,  we  must  be  satisfied  with 
the  expressed  view  of  Badaraya?ia  that  the  evidence 
for  what  the  Vedanta  teaches  is  neither  perception 
nor  inference,  but  the  Word  ($abda)  alone,  such  as 
we  find  it  in  our  manuscripts,  or  rather  in  the 
oral  tradition  of  the  Veda. 

Work-part  and  Knowledge-part  of  the  Veda. 

Of  course  a  distinction  has  to  be  made,  and  has 
been  made  by  Badarayawa  between  the  Knowledge- 
part,  the  6r?lana-karic£a,  chiefly  the  Upanishads,  and 
the  Karma-kanc/a,  the  Work-part,  the  hymns  and 
Brahman  as.  Both  are  called  Veda  or  /Stuti,  revela- 
tion, and  yet  the  work-part  does  not  exist  for  the 
true  philosopher,  except  in  order  to  be  discarded  as 
soon  as  he  has  understood  the  knowledge-part.  Sam- 
kara  is  bold  enough  to  declare  that  the  whole  Veda 
is  useless  to  a  man  who  has  obtained  knowledge,  or 
Mukti,  or  freedom.  '  Not  all  the  Vedas  together,' 
he  says,  '  are  more  useful  to  one  who  has  obtained 
true  knowledge  than  is  a  small  tank  of  water  in 
a  country  flooded  with  water/  A  man  who  has 
neglected  the  Vedas  and  disregarded  the  rules  of 
the  four  A.sramas,  in  fact,  a  man  who  has  lost  caste, 
may  still  be  allowed  to  study  the  Vedanta  as  the 
fountain  of  all  true  knowledge,  and  thus  become 
liberated  (III,  4,  36).  The  hymns  and  Bralmia/ias 
refer  in  fact  to  the  phenomenal  world,  they  pre- 
suppose the  existence  of  a  manifold  creation,  of  an 
enjoyer  of  what  is  to  be  enjoyed,  of  good  works  and 


SUBJECT    AND    OBJECT.  199 

their  fruit.  But  all  this,  as  we  shall  see,  is  not  real, 
but  phenomenal;  it  belongs  to  the  realm  of  Avidya, 
Nescience,  and  vanishes  as  soon  as  true  wisdom  or 
Vidya  has  been  obtained.  It  is  to  be  observed  in 
the  world,  such  as  it  is,  as  a  lower  stage,  but  as 
essential  in  leading  on  to  a  higher  stage. 


and 

If  then  the  highest  truth  contained  in  the  Veda 
is  the  Tat  Tvam  Asi,  that  is,  Thou,  the  6rivatman,  art 
it  (the  Paramatman  or  Brahman),  and  if,  as  we  are 
told,  there  is  but  one  Brahman  and  nothing  beside 
it,  the  Vedanta  philosopher  is  at  once  met  by  the 
question,  How  then  are  we  to  account  for  the 
manifold  Thou's,  the  many  individuals,  and  the 
immense  variety  of  the  objective  world  ?  If  the 
Veda  is  true,  our  view  of  the  world  cannot  be 
true  at  the  same  time.  It  can  therefore  be  due 
only  to  what  is  called  Avidya,  Nescience,  and  it  is 
the  very  o.bject  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy  to  expel 
and  annihilate  this  Avidya,  and  replace  it  by 
VidyL 

Subject  and  Object. 

This  Avidy^  is  the  next  point  that  has  to  be 
discussed.  /Sawkara,  in  the  introduction  to  his  com- 
mentary, has  some  important  remarks  on  it  ].  '  As  it 
is  well  known,'  he  says,  '  that  object  and  subject, 
which  fall  under  the  concepts  of  We  and  You  (or 
as  we  should  say,  of  the  Ego  and  Non-Ego),  are  in 
their  very  essence  opposed  to  each  other,  like  dark- 
ness and  light,  and  that  the  one  can  never  therefore 
take  the  place  of  the  other,  it  follows  further  that 

1  Three  Lectures  on  the  Vedanta,  p.  62. 


200  INDIAN   .PHILOSOPHY. 

their   attributes  also  can  never   be   interchanged.' 
This    means    that    object    and     subject    mutually 
exclude  each   other,  so  that  what  is  conceived  as 
object  can  never  in  the  same  act   of  thought    be 
conceived  as  subject,  and  vice  versa.     We  can,  for 
instance,  never  say  or  think  :  We  are  you,  or  You 
are  we,  nor  ought  we  ever  to  substitute  subjective 
for  objective  qualities.     '  Therefore,'  he    continues, 
'  we  may  conclude  that  to  transfer  what  is  objective, 
that  is  what  is  perceived  as  You  or  Non-ego  with 
its   qualities,  to  what   is   subjective,   that  is  what 
perceives  as  We,  the  Ego,  which  consists  of  thought, 
or   vice   ve*rsa    to   transfer   what    is    subjective    to 
what   is   objective,   must   be  altogether  wrong.'     A 
subject  can  never  be  anything  but  a  subject,  the 
object  always  remains  the  object.    '  Nevertheless,'  he 
adds,  '  it  is  a  habit  in  human  nature  (a  necessity  of 
thought,  as  we  might  call  it),  to  say,  combining  what 
is  true  and  what  is  false,  "  I  am  this,"  "  this  is  mine," 
&c.     This  is  a  habit,  caused  by  a  false  apprehension 
of  subject  and  predicate,  and  by  not  distinguishing 
one  from  the  other,  but  transferring  the  essence  and 
the  qualities  of  the  one  upon  the  other.' 

It  is  clear  that  $amkara  here  uses  subject  and 
object  not  only  in  their  simple  logical  sense,  but 
that  by  subject  he  means  what  is  real  and  true,  in 
fact  the  Self,  while  object  means  with  him  what 
is  unreal  and  phenomenal,  such  as  the  body  with  its 
organs,  and  the  whole  visible  world.  In  '  I  am,'  the 
verb  has  a  totally  different  character  from  what  it  has 
in  '  thou  art '  or  '  he  is.'  Such  statements  therefore 
as  '  T  am  strong,'  or  '  I  am  blind,'  arise  from  a  false 
apprehension  which,  though  it  is  inseparable  from 
human  thought,  such  as  it  is,  has  slowly  to  be  over- 


SUBJECT  AND  OBJECT.  2O1 

come  and  at  last  to  be  destroyed  by  the  Vedanta- 
philosophy. 

This  distinction  between  subject  and  object  in 
the  sense  of  what  is  real  and  what  is  phenomenal 
is  very  important,  and  stamps  the  whole  of  the 
Vedanta-philosophy  with  its  own  peculiar  character. 

It  follows  in  fact  from  this  fundamental  distinc- 
tion that  we  should  never  predicate  what  is  pheno- 
menal or  objective  of  what  is  real  and  subjective,  or 
what  is  real  and  subjective  of  what  is  phenomenal 
and  objective;  and  it  is  in  causing  this  mistake  that 
the  chief  power  of  Avidy&  or  Nescience  consists. 
I  should  even  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  this  warning 
might  be  taken  to  heart  by  our  own  philosophers 
also,  for  many  of  our  own  fallacies  arise  from  the  same 
Avidya,  and  are  due  in  the  end  to  the  attribution  of 
phenomenal  and  objective  qualities  to  the  subjective 
realities  which  we  should  recognise  in  the  Divine 
only,  and  as  underlying  the  Human  Self  and  the 
phenomenal  world. 

It  must  not  be  supposed,  however,  that  the 
Avidya  or  Nescience  which  makes  the  world  what 
we  make  it  and  take  it  to  be,  is  simply  our  own 
individual  ignorance,  our  being  unacquainted  with 
the  truths  of  the  Vedanta.  It  should  rather  be 
looked  upon  as  inborn  in  human  nature,  or,  from  an 
Indian  point  of  view,  as  the  result  of  accumulated 
thoughts  and  deeds  before  the  mountains  were 
brought  forth.  It  has  truly  been  called  a  general 
cosmical  Nescience,  inevitable  for  a  time,  as  darkness 
is  with  light.  So  far  as  in  true  reality  we  are 
Brahman,  our  Nescience  might  indeed  be  called 
the  Nescience  of  Brahman,  if  for  a  time  only  ;  and 
if  we  remember  that  it  can  be  annihilated,  we  can 


202  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

understand  why  it  was  said  to  be  nought,  for, 
according  to  a  general  principle  of  the  Vedanta, 
nothing  that  is  real  can  ever  be  annihilated,  so 
that  nothing  that  is  liable  to  annihilation  has 
a  right  to  be  called  real. 

The  Phenomenal  Reality  of  the  World. 

But  it  is  very  curious  to  find  that  though  $a??ikara 
looks  upon  the  whole  objective  world  as  the  result 
of  Nescience,  he  nevertheless  allows  it  to  be  real  for 
all  practical  purposes  (Vyavaharartham).  Thus  wre 
read  (II,  i,  14),  'The  entire  complex  of  phenomenal 
existence  is  considered  as  true  so  long  as  the  know- 
ledge of  Brahman  and  the  Self  of  all  has  not  arisen, 
just  as  the  phantoms  of  a  dream  are  considered  to 
l)e  true  until  the  sleeper  wakes.  .  .  .'  Hence,  as  long 
as  true  knowledge  does  not  present  itself,  there  is 
no  reason  why  the  ordinary  course  of  secular  and 
religious  activity  should  not  go  on  undisturbed,  and 
more  particularly,  why  all  the  commands  of  the 
Veda,  even  of  the  work-part,  should  not  be  obeyed. 

But  apart  from  this  concession,  the  fundamental 
doctrine  of  $amkara  remains  always  the  same. 
There  is  Brahman  and  nothing  else  ;  and  to  this 
Brahman  as  the  subject,  nothing  must  be  ascribed 
that  is  peculiar  to  the  individual  living  soul  (I,  3, 
19).  The  individual  soul  is,  no  doubt,  Brahman,  for 
the  simple  reason  that  there  is  nothing  but  Brah- 
man, but  Brahman  is  not  the  individual  soul,  which 
in  its  present  state  is  personal,  that  is  conditioned, 
and  phenomenal.  All  we  may  predicate  of  that 
Highest  Brahman  is  that  it  is  one,  never  changing, 
never  in  contact  with  anything,  devoid  of  all  form, 
eternally  pure,  intelligent  and  free.  To  ascribe 
anything  phenomenal  to  that  Brahman  or  Atman 


CREATION    OR    CAUSATION.  203 

would  be  the  same  error  as  to  ascribe  blue  colour  to 
the  colourless  ether  of  the  sky. 

Creation  or  Causation. 

If  with  these  ideas,  taken  as  granted,  we  approach 
the  problem  of  what  we  call  the  creation  or  the  making 
of  the  world,  it  is  clear  that  creation  in  our  sense  cannot 
exist  for  the  Vedantist.  As  long  as  creation  is  con- 
ceived as  a  making  or  fashioning  of  matter,  it  does 
not  exist  for  Badaraya?ia ;  only  so  far  as  it  is  a  calling 
forth  out  of  nothing  does  it  approach  the  ideas  of 
the  Vedantist.  Creation  with  Badaraya?^a  would  be 
nothing  but  the  result  of  Nescience,  and  yet  Brah- 
man is  again  and  again  represented  as  the  cause  of 
the  world,  and  not  only  as  the  efficient,  but  as  the 
material  cause  as  well,  so  far  as  such  foreign  terms 
can  be  applied  to  the  reasoning  of  the  Vedanta. 
Here  lies  our  great  difficulty  in  rendering  Hindu- 
philosophy  intelligible.  The  terms  used  by  them 
seem  to  be  the  same  as  those  which  we  use  our- 
selves, and  yet  they  are  not.  It  is  easy  to  say  that 
Karana  is  cause  and  Karya  effect,  that  the  created 
world  is  the  effect,  and  that  Brahman  is  the  cause. 
But  the  Vedantists  have  elaborated  their  own 
theory  of  cause  and  effect.  According  to  them 
cause  and  effect  are  really  the  same  thing  looked 
at  from  two  points  of  view,  and  the  effect  is  always 
supposed  to  be  latent  in  the  cause.  Hence,  if 
Brahman  is  everything,  and  nothing  exists  besides 
Brahman,  the  substance  of  the  world  can  be  nothing 
but  Brahman.  Divyadasa,  a  living  Vedantist, 
seems  therefore  to  draw  a  quite  legitimate  inference 
when  he  says  l  that  the  universe  with  all  its  sins 

1  Lectures  on  the  Vedanta,  p.  24. 


204  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  miseries  mijst  have  existed  latent  in  Brahman, 
just  as  steam  existed  latent  in  water  before  it  was 
heated,  though  it  does  not  become  evident  as 
vapour  till  fire  is  brought  near  to-  water. 

Cause  and  Effect. 

This  question  of  cause  and  effect  and  their 
mutual  relation  has  occupied  most  of  the  philo- 
sophical systems  of  India  ;  and  when  we  remember 
what  different  views  of  cause  and  effect  have  been 
held  by  some  of  the  most  eminent  philosophers  of 
Europe,  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  Hindus  also 
should  have  arrived  at  very  different  results.  The 
Vedantists  stand  up  for  Karya-kara?iabheda,  the 
non-difference  or  substantial  identity  of  cause  and 
effect,  and  the  Sarakhya  philosophers  agree  with 
them  up  to  a  certain  point.  In  the  Vedanta,  II,  i, 
14,  we  read  in  so  many  words,  Tadananyatvam,  that 
is,  '  they,  cause  and  effect,  are  not  other,  are  not 
different  from  each  other.'  On  this,  as  a  general 
principle,  rests  their  dogma  of  the  substantial 
identity  of  Brahman  and  the  phenomenal  world.  Nor 
does  /Sa?/ikara  support  this  principle  by  passages 
from  the  Veda  only,  but  he  appeals  likewise  to 
observation.  Thus  he  continues,  II,  i,  15,  'Only 
when  a  cause  exists  is  an  effect  observed  to  exist, 
not  when  it  does  not  exist.  The  non-difference  of 
the  two  (cause  and  effect)  is  perceived,  for  instance, 
in  an  aggregate  of  threads,  when  we  do  not  perceive 
the  thing  which  we  call  cloth  in  addition  to  the 
threads,  but  merely  threads  running  lengthways, 
and  crossways.  In  the  threads  again  we  perceive 
finer  threads,  and  in  these  again  still  finer  threads, 
and  so  on.  On  this  ground  we  conclude  that  the 


CAUSE    AND    EFFECT.  205 

very  finest  parts  which  we  can  perceive  are  ulti- 
mately identical  with  their  causes,  viz.  red,  white, 
and  black,  these  again  with  air,  the  air  with  ether, 
and,  at  last,  the  ether  with  Brahman  which  is  with- 
out a  second  and  the  ultimate  cause  of  the  whole 
world.'  Or  again,  when  we  look  at  a  tree  and  ask 
what  it  is,  when  we  see  through  its  leaves  and 
fruits,  its  bark  and  wood,  and  ask  again  what  it  is, 
the  answer  comes  that  it  would  be  nothing  if  it 
were  not  Brahman,  that  it  lives  through  Brahman, 
that  it  exists  through  Brahman,  that  it  would  not 
be  at  all  but  for  Brahman.  This  is  the  real  Pan- 
theism of  the  Vedanta  :  and  strange  as  it  may  sound 
to  us,  it  would  not  be  difficult  to  match  it  whether 
from  our  own  philosophers  or  our  poets.  Even  so 
recent  a  poet  as  Tennyson  is  reported  to  have  said, 
'  Perhaps  this  earth  and  all  that  is  in  it — storms, 
mountains,  cataracts,  the  sun  and  the  skies,  are  the 
Almighty  :  in  fact,  such  is  our  petty  nature,  we 
cannot  see  Him,  but  we  see  His  shadow,  as  it  were, 
a  distorted  shadow.'  Is  not  this  pure  Vedanta  ?  only 
that  the  Vedantists  hold  that  a  cause,  by  its  very 
nature,  can  never  become  the  object  of  perception, 
while  what  Tennyson  calls  the  distorted  shadow 
would  come  very  near  to  the  Avidya  of  $amkara. 
The  Veda  has  declared  '  that  what  is  posterior  in 
time,  i.  e.  the  effect,  has  its  being,  previous  to  its 
actual  beginning,  in  the  nature  of  the  cause.'  And 
A^amkara  adds  that,  even  in  cases  where  the  con- 
tinued existence  of  the  cause  (in  the  effect)  is  not 
perceived,  as,  for  instance,  in  the  case  of  seeds  of 
the  fig-tree  from  which  spring  sprouts  and  new 
trees,  the  term  birth,  as  applied  to  the  sprout, 
means  only  that  the  causal  substance,  viz.  the  seed, 


206  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

becomes  visible  by  becoming  a  sprout  through  the 
continued  accretion  of  similar  particles,  while  the 
term  death  means  no  more  than  that  through  the 
secession  of  these  particles,  the  cause  passes  again 
beyond  the  sphere  of  visibility. 

This  problem  of  cause  and  effect  in  connection 
with  the  problem  of  Brahman  and  the  world  was 
no  doubt  beset  with  difficulties  in  the  eyes  of  the 
Vedantists.  If  they  turned  to  the  Veda,  particularly 
to  the  Upanishads,  there  were  ever  so  many  passages 
declaring  that  Brahman  is  one  and  unchangeable, 
while  in  other  passages  the  same  Brahman  is  called 
the  Creator,  and  from  him,  and  not,  as  the  Samkhyas 
hold,  from  a  second  non-intelligent  power,  called 
Prak?*iti,  the  creation,  sustentation,  and  reabsorption 
of  the  world  are  said  to  proceed.  If  it  be  asked 
how  two  such  opinions  can  be  reconciled,  $amkara 
answers :  '  Belonging  to  the  Self,  as  it  were,  of  the 
omniscient  Lord,  there  are  names  and  forms  (Nama- 
rupa).'  These  correspond  very  closely  to  the  Logoi 
of  Greek  philosophy,  except  that,  instead  of  being 
the  ideas  of  a  Divine  Mind,  they  are  the  figments  of 
Nescience,  not  to  be  defined  as  either  real  (Brahman), 
or  as  different  from  it.  They  are  the  germs  of  the 
entire  expanse  of  the  phenomenal  world,  that  is,  of 
what  in  >S'ruti  and  Smrzti  is  called  illusion  (Maya), 
power  (*S'akti),  or  nature  (Prakrtti).  Different,  how- 
ever, from  all  this  is  the  Omniscient  Lord,  and  in 
support  of  this  a  number  of  Vedic  passages  may 
be  quoted,  such  as  '  He  who  is  called  Ether  is  the 
revealer  of  all  forms  and  names  ;  that  wherein  these 
forms  and  names  are  contained,  that  is  Brahman' 
('A7*and.  Up.  VIII,  14,  i)  ;  '  Let  me  evolve  names  and 
forms'  (AV/tind.  Up.  VI,  3,  2)  ;  '  lie,  the  wise  one, 


CAUSE    AND    EFFECT.  207 

having  defined  all  forms  and  having  made  their 
names,  sits  speaking/  i.e.  creating  (Taitt.  Ar.  Ill,  12, 
7) ;  'He  who  makes  the  one  seed  manifold'  (Svel.  Up. 
VI,  12).  The  Lord  as  creator,  as  Lord  or  Isvara,  de- 
pends upon  the  limiting  conditions  or  the  Upadhis 
of  name  and  form,  and  these,  even  in  the  Lord,  are 
represented  as  products  of  Nescience,  not  like  the 
Logoi,  creations  of  a  Divine  Wisdom.  The  true 
Self,  according  to  the  Vedanta,  is  all  the  time  free 
from  all  conditions,  free  from  names  and  forms,  and 
for  the  truly  informed  or  enlightened  man  the  whole 
phenomenal  world  is  really  non-existent. 

To  steer  between  all  these  rocks  is  no  easy  matter. 
Brahman,  though  called  the  material  cause  (Upadana) 
of  the  world,  is  himself  immaterial,  nay  the  world,  of 
which  he  is  the  cause,  is  considered  as  unreal,  while 
at  the  same  time  cause  and  effect  are  held  to  be 
identical  in  substance. 

While  the  Vedantist  is  threatened  by  all  these 
breakers,  the  Samkhya  philosopher  is  far  less 
imperilled.  He  starts  with  a  PrakHti,  a  power 
different  from  Brahman,  generally,  though  very 
imperfectly,  translated  by  Nature,  as  the  material 
cause  of  the  world.  PrakHti  exists,  as  far  as  man 
is  concerned,  only  so  far  as  it  is  taken  notice  of  by 
man  (Purusha) ;  and  he,  the  Purusha,  on  taking 
notice,  may  therefore  be  called  the  efficient  cause  of 
the  world,  PrakHti  itself  being  its  material  cause. 
Otherwise  Kapila  takes  much  the  same  view  of  the 
relation  between  cause  and  effect  as  the  Vedantist. 
The  Karya-kara?iabheda,  the  identity  of  cause  and 
effect,  is  valid  as  much  for  S&mkhya  as  for  Vedanta. 
According  to  both,  no  real  effect  would  be  possible 
without  the  continuance  of  its  cause.  Though  dif- 


208  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ferent  in  appearance  or  phenomenally,  both  are  the 
same  substantially.  An  effect  is  not  something 
newly  produced  or  created,  it  is  a  new  manifestation 
only,  the  cause  being  never  destroyed,  but  rendered 
invisible  only.  This  is  so  characteristic  a  dogma  of 
the  Sawkhya  that  this  philosophy  is  often  spoken  of 
as  the  Sat-karyavada,  the  doctrine  that  every  effect 
pre-exists,  and  is  the  effect  of  something  real,  while  the 
Asat-karyavada  is  peculiar  to  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika, 
and  strongly  supported  by  the  Buddhists.  Whether 
this  doctrine  of  the  identity  of  cause  and  effect  was 
first  proclaimed  by  Kapila  or  by  Badarayana  is 
almost  impossible  to  settle.  Professor  Garbe  l,  who 
claims  it  for  Kapila,  may  be  right  in  supposing  that 
it  would  be  a  more  natural  theorem  for  a  follower 
of  the  Sawikhya  than  of  the  Vedtinta,  but  this  could 
never  be  used  as  an  argument  that  the  Sft???khya- 
philosophy  is  older  in  its  entirety  than  the  Vedanta. 
fSawkara  himself  certainly  gives  us  the  impression 
that  with  him  the  recognition  of  the  identity  of  cause 
and  effect  came  first,  and  afterwards  its  religious 
application,  the  identity  of  Brahman  and  the  world. 
For  he  says  (II,  i,  20),  'Thus  the  non-difference  of 
the  effect  from  the  cause  is  to  be  conceived.  And 
therefore,  as  the  whole  world  is  an  effect  of  Brahman, 
and  non-different  from  it,  the  promise  is  fulfilled.' 
It  is  curious  that  Kapila  seems,  almost  in  so  many 
words,  to  guard  against  what  is  known  to  us  as 
Hume's  view  of  causality.  For  in  Sutra  I,  4,  i,  lie 
says,  '  If  it  were  only  priority,  there  would  be  no 
law  or  hold  (Niyama)  between  cause  and  effect.' 
The  Sat-karyavada,  which  might  be  compared  with 


1  Samkhya -Philosophic,  p.  232. 


DREAMING    AND    WAKING.  209 

Herbart's  Selbsterhaltung  des  Realen,  is  often  illus- 
trated by  the  very  popular  simile  of  the  rope  which 
is  mistaken  for  a  snake,  but  which,  even  in  its  mis- 
taken character,  has  the  very  real  effect  of  frightening 
those  who  step  on  it.  There  is  more  in  this  often- 
quoted  simile  than  at  first  sight  appears.  It  is 
meant  to  show  that  as  the  rope  is  to  the  snake,  so 
Brahman  is  to  the  world.  There  is  no  idea  of  claim- 
ing for  the  rope  a  real  change  into  a  snake,  and  in 
the  same  way  no  real  change  can  be  claimed  for 
Brahman,  when  perceived  as  the  world.  Brahman 
presents  itself  as  the  world,  and  apart  from  Brahman 
the  world  would  be  simply  nothing.  If,  therefore, 
Brahman  is  called  the  material  cause  of  the  world, 
this  is  not  meant  in  the  sense  in  which  the  clay  is 
the  material  cause  of  a  jar.  Even  the  apparent 
and  illusory  existence  of  a  material  world  requires 
a  real  substratum,  which  is  Brahman,  just  as  the 
appearance  of  the  snake  in  the  simile  requires  the 
real  substratum  of  a  rope.  If  we  once  see  this 
clearly,  we  shall  also  see  that  Nescience  may  quite 
as  well  be  called  the  material  cause  of  the  world  as 
Brahman,  the  fact  being  that,  strictly  speaking, 
there  is  with  the  Vedaiitists  no  matter  at  all,  in 
our  sense  of  the  word. 

Dreaming  and  Waking. 

There  is,  however,  in  the  Vedanta,  as  well  as  in 
many  other  systems  of  philosophy,  a  certain  ambiguity 
as  to  what  is  meant  by  material  and  real.  One 
would  have  thought  that  philosophers,  who  look 
upon  everything  as  the  result  of  Avidy&  or  Nescience, 
would  have  denied  all  reality  in  the  highest  sense 
to  everything  except  Brahman.  And  so  in  a  certain 

p 


210  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

sense  they  do.  But  besides  the  concession  to  which 
we  alluded  before,  that  for  practical  purposes  (Vya- 
vaharartham)  things  may  be  treated  as  real,  what- 
ever we  may  think  of  them  in  our  heart  of  hearts, 
a  concession,  by-the-by,  which  even  Berkeley  and 
Kant  would  readily  have  allowed,  there  is  another 
important  argument.  It  is  clearly  directed  against 
Buddhist  philosophers  who,  carrying  the  Vedanta 
principle  to  its  extreme  consequences,  held  that 
everything  is  empty  and  unreal,  and  that  all  we 
have  and  know  are  our  perceptions  only.  This  is 
called  the  $ilnyavada  (doctrine  of  emptiness  or 
vanity)  or  Vidyamatra  (knowledge  only).  Although 
some  Vedantists  have  been  credited  with  holding 
the  same  opinion,  and  have  actually  been  called 
Cryptobuddhists  in  consequence,  /Samkara  himself 
argues  most  strongly  against  this  extreme  idealism. 
He  not  only  allows  the  reality  of  the  objective 
world  for  practical  purposes  (Vyavaharartham),  but 
he  enters  on  a  full  argument  against  the  nihilism  of 
the  Buddhists.  These  maintain  that  perception  in 
dreams  is  of  the  same  kind  as  all  other  perception, 
and  that  the  admission  of  the  existence  of  external 
things  is  therefore  unnecessary.  No,  says  $a??ikara, 
there  is  a  difference  between  perceiving  viands  and 
perceiving  the  satisfaction  arising  from  eating  them. 
He  holds,  therefore,  that  in  perceiving  anything  we 
not  only  perceive  our  perceptions,  but  perceive  some- 
thing not  ourselves,  and  not  our  perceptions.  He 
also  points  out  that  there  is  this  difference  between 
dreaming  and  waking,  that  dreams  on  awaking  are 
found  to  be  unreal.  Dreams  at  night  are  contra- 
dicted by  full  daylight,  but  perceptions  in  full  day-* 
light  are  not  contradicted  by  dreams.  When  the 


DREAMING    AND    WAKING.  211 

Buddhist  replies  that,  in  spite  of  that,  we  never  can 
be  said  to  perceive  anything  but  perceptions,  the 
Ved4ntist  answers  that,  though  we  perceive  percep- 
tions only,  these  perceptions  are  always  perceived 
as  perceptions  of  something.  And  if  the  Buddhists 
answer  that  these  perceptions  are  illusive  only,  that 
they  are  perceptions  of  things  as  if  they  were  with- 
out us,  the  Vedantist  asks  What  is  meant  by  that 
'without  us,'  to  which  all  things  perceived  by  us  are 
referred  ?  If  our  perceptions  conform  to  anything 
without  us,  the  existence  of  such  perceived  objects 
is  ipso  facto  admitted.  No  one  would  say  that  per- 
ception and  what  is  perceived  are  identical ;  they 
stand  to  each  other  in  the  relation  of  instrument 
and  effect,  just  as  when  we  speak  of  an  impression, 
we  admit  something  that  impresses  as  well  as  some- 
thing that  is  impressed. 

This  must  suffice  to  show  what  the  Vedantists 
thought  of  the  difference  between  the  real  and 
the  phenomenal,  and  what  was  the  meaning  they 
attached  to  Avidya  by  which  not  only  the  individual 
Egos,  but  the  whole  phenomenal  world  exists  or 
seems  to  exist.  Creation  is  not  real  in  the  highest 
sense  in  which  Brahman  is  real,  but  it  is  real  in  so 
far  as  it  is  phenomenal,  for  nothing  can  be  pheno- 
menal except  as  the  phenomenon  of  something  that 
is  real.  No  wonder  that,  with  all  these  ambiguities 
about  the  phenomenally  real  and  the  really  real, 
different  schools  even  in  India  should  have  differed 
in  their  views  about  Avidya,  and  that  European 
scholars  also  should  have  failed  to  form  a  clear  idea 
of  that  creative  Nescience  of  which  we  can  neither 
say  that  it  is  or  that  it  is  not.  Avidya,  like  all 
other  words,  has  had  a  history.  In  the  Upanishads 

p  2 


212  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

it  is  often  used  in  the  simple  sense  of  ignorance,  and 
opposed  to  Vidya,  knowledge.  Both  are  in  that 
sense  simply  subjective.  Thus  we  read,  Kh&nd. 
Up.  I,  i,  10:  'Both  perform  the  sacrificial  act,  he 
who  knows  and  he  who  does  not  know.  But  there 
is  a  difference  between  Vidy£  (knowledge)  and 
Avidy&  (nescience).  For  what  is  performed  with 
Vidya,  with  faith,  and  with  the  Upanishad,  that  is 
more  efficacious.'  Or  again,  Brz'h.  Ar.  Up.  IV,  3, 
20  :  '  If  he  feels  in  a  dream  as  if  he  were  murdered, 
then,  in  his  ignorance,  he  takes  that  to  be  real 
whatever  he  fears,  when  awake.'  Here  we  see  that 
it  is  ignorance  alone  which  imparts  a  false  character 
of  reality  to  the  visions  of  a  dream.  In  the  same 
Upanishad,  IV,  4,  3,  a  man,  when  dying,  is  said  to 
shake  off  his  body  and  his  Avidya.  We  are  right 
therefore,  I  believe,  if  historically  we  trace  the  con- 
cept of  Avidya  back  to  the  subjective  ignorance 
of  the  individual,  just  as  we  saw  that  the  higher 
concept  of  the  Self,  though  in  the  end  identical 
with  Brahman,  arose  from  that  of  the  individual 
personal  Self,  when  as  yet  not  free  from  the  limits 
of  the  Ego.  In  some  of  the  later  Upanishads 
this  Nescience  or  Ignorance  assumes  a  more  inde- 
pendent character  and  even  a  new  name,  viz.  Maya. 
It  is  then  no  longer  the  Nescience  of  the  individual, 
but  the  result  of  that  universal  Nescience,  which  is 
the  cause  of  what  we  should  call  the  phenomenal 
world.  Thus  we  read  in  the  /SVet.  Up.  IV,  10  : 
'  Know  Prakn'ti  (nature)  as  Maya  (magic),  and  the 
great  Lord  as  the  Mayin  (magician).'  Though  this 
is  not  pure  Vedanta,  it  shows  us,  at  all  events, 
the  way  by  which  the  ignorance  of  the  individual 
became  the  cause  of  what  we  call  objective  reality, 


DREAMING    AND    WAKING.  213 

and  led,  at  the  same  time,  to  the  admission  of  an 
active  and  creative  Lord,  the  personal  Brahm£  or 
Isvara ;  how  Avidya  in  fact  became  a  $akti  or 
potentia,  somehow  or  other  related  to  Brahman 
itself. 

But  before  there  arises  this  May&  of  objective 
nature,  belonging  as  it  were  to  Brahman  himself, 
there  was  the  Maya  of  the  internal  or  subjective 
world.  This  was  originally  the  only  Maya,  and, 
deceived  by  that  Maya  or  Avidya,  the  Atman,  or 
pure  Self,  was  covered  up  (Upahita)  or  blinded, 
or  conditioned  by  the  so-called  Upadhis,  the  con- 
ditions or  impositions,  if  we  may  say  so,  in  both 
senses.  There  is  here  again  a  certain  ambiguity, 
the  Upadhis  being  caused  by  primeval  Avidya,  and, 
from  another  point  of  view,  Avidy&  being  caused 
in  the  individual  soul  ((rivatman)  by  the  Upadhis. 
These  Upadhis  are : — 

1.  The    Mukhyaprana,    the    vital    spirit    (uncon- 
scious) ; 

2.  the  Manas,   the  central  organ  of  perception, 
ready  to    receive    what  is   conveyed  to  it    by  the 
separate   senses,    and   to    react    on   them    by   will, 
Manas  being  that  which,  as  we  say,  perceives,  feels, 
thinks  and  wills  ; 

3.  the  Indriyas,  the  five  senses,  both  afferent  and 
efferent.     The  five  afferent  (Upalabdhi)  senses  are 
the  senses  of  hearing,  touch,  sight,  taste,  scent.    The 
five  efferent  or  acting  senses   (Adhyavasaya l)   are 
the  senses  of  speaking,  grasping,  going,  evacuating 
and  generating ; 

4.  the  material  organic  body. 


1  Adhyavasayo  buddhi/A,  Sawkhya-Sufcras  II,  13. 


214  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

To  these  is  sometimes  added — 

5.  The  objective  environment,  or  the  objects  or 
meanings  of  the  senses  (Artha). 

All  these  are  not  the  Atman,  and  it  is  only 
through  Avidya  that  the  Atman  has  become  identi- 
fied with  them. 

That  there  is  in  man  something  that  can  be  called 
Atman  or  Self  requires  no  proof,  but  if  a  proof  were 
wanted  it  would  be  found  in  the  fact  that  no  one 
can  say,  '  I  am  not '  (I  being  the  disguised  Atman), 
for  he  who  would  say  so,  would  himself  be  not,  or 
would  not  be.  The  question  then  is  What  is  really 
I  or  what  is  there  real  behind  the  I.  It  cannot  be  the 
body  as  influenced  by  our  objective  environment,  for 
that  body  is  perishable  ;  it  cannot  be  the  Indriyas  or 
the  Manas  or  the  Mukhyaprima,  for  all  these  have 
a  beginning,  a  growth,  and  therefore  an  end.  All 
these,  called  the  Upadhis,  conditions,  are  to  be 
treated  as  Not-self;  arid  if  it  be  asked  why  they 
should  ever  have  been  treated  as  Self,  the  only 
possible  answer  is  that  it  was  through  Nescience 
or  Avidya,  but  through  a  Nescience  that  is  not 
only  casual  or  individual,  but  universal.  What  in 
our  common  language  we  call  the  Ego  or  Aha?nkara 
is  but  a  product  of  the  Manas  and  quite  as  un- 
substantial in  reality  as  the  Manas  itself,  the  senses 
and  the  whole  body. 

We  can  understand  how  this  startling  idealism  or 
monism — for  it  is  not  nihilism,  though  our  philosophy 
has  no  better  name  for  it — led  to  two  distinct,  yet 
closely  united  views  of  the  world.  All  that  we  should 
call  phenomenal,  comprehending  the  phenomena  of 
our  inward  as  well  as  of  our  outward  experience, 
was  unreal ;  but,  as  the  phenomenal  was  considered 


THE    HIGHER    AND    THE    LOWER    KNOWLEDGE.        215 

impossible  without  the  noumenal,  that  is,  without 
the  real  Brahman,  it  was  in  that  sense  real  also, 
that  is,  it  exists,  and  can  only  exist,  with  Brahman 
behind  it.  And  this  led  to  the  admission  by  the 
strict  Advaitists  or  Monists  of  two  kinds  of  know- 
ledge, well  known  under  the  names  of  Apara-,  the 
lower,  and  Para,  the  higher  knowledge. 

The  Higher  and  the  Lower  Knowledge. 

The  higher  knowledge  consists  in  the  distinction 
and  thereby  the  freedom  of  the  Self  (Atman)  from 
all  its  Upadhis,  and  this  not  for  this  life  only, 
but  for  all  eternity.  This  is  the  true  Moksha  or 
freedom  which  implies  knowledge  of  the  identity 
of  the  Atman  with  Brahman,  and  deliverance  from 
birth  and  rebirth  in  the  constant  evolution  (Sa??isara) 
of  the  world.  The  lower  knowledge  is  likewise 
founded  on  the  Veda,  but  chiefly  on  its  work-portion 
(Karmakant/a),  and  teaches,  not  how  Brahman  is  to 
be  known,  but  how  it  or  he  is  to  be  worshipped  in 
its  or  his  phenomenal  state,  that  is,  as  a  personal 
Lord  and  Creator,  or  even  under  the  name  of  any 
individual  deity.  This  worship  (Upasana)  being 
enjoined  in  many  parts  of  the  Veda,  is  recognised 
as  obligatory  on  all  who  have  not  yet  reached  the 
highest  knowledge.  These  are  even  allowed  the 
comfort  that,  in  worshipping  a  personal  god,  they 
are  really  worshipping  Brahman,  the  true  Godhead, 
though  in  its  phenomenal  aspect  only,  and  they  are 
promised,  as  a  reward  of  their  worship,  happiness 
on  earth  and  in  heaven,  nay  by  way  of  preparation, 
a  slow  advance  (Kramamukti)  towards  complete 
Moksha  or  freedom. 

In  this  sense  it  has  been  truly  said  that  $a??ikara 


2l6  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

did  not  attack  or  destroy  idolatry,  though  with  him 
it  was  always  symbolism  rather  than  idolatry.  On 
this  point  which  has  given  rise  to  much  controversy 
among  the  Hindus  themselves,  some  appealing  to 
$amkara's  contempt  of  all  ritualism  and  Karman, 
others  to  his  defence  of  a  worship  of  the  popular 
gods,  I  may  quote  the  words  of  a  living  Vedantist, 
Divyadds  Datta,  in  his  Lecture  on  Vedantism,  p.  12. 
'  It  is  certain,'  he  says,  '  that  $a??ikara  was  opposed 
to  the  abuse  of  ritualism,  and  though  he  did  not 
cut  off  all  connection  with  idolatry,  he  tried  to 
introduce  the  right  spirit  of  idolatry.  Idolatry  in 
the  sense  of  religious  symbolism— and  I  believe  the 
most  orthodox  Hindus  would  take  no  other  view— 
cannot  be  open  to  objection.  Symbolism  there 
must  be,  whether  in  words  or  things.  Verbal 
symbols  appeal  to  the  ear,  and  the  symbols  of 
things  to  the  eye,  and  that  is  all  the  difference 
between  them.  Verbal  symbolism  is  language. 
Who  would  object  to  the  use  of  language  in 
religion  ?  But  if  the  one  is  allowed,  why  should 
not  also  the  other  ?  To  my  mind,  idolatry,  apart 
from  its  attendant  corruptions,  is  a  religious  algebra. 
And  if  verbal  symbols,  without  the  spirit  or  in  a 
corrupted  spirit,  are  not  objectionable,  [but  are  they 
not  ?]  so,  and  to  the  same  extent,  formal  symbols,  or 
stocks  and  stones  also  are  unobjectionable.  At  one 
stage  of  its  growth,  idolatry  is  a  necessity  of  our 
nature.  The  tender  seed  of  a  religious  spirit  requires 
to  be  carefully  preserved  in  a  soft  coating  of  symbols, 
till  it  has  acquired  the  strength  to  resist  the  nipping 
frost  of  worldliness  and  scepticism.  .  .  .  When  the 
religious  spirit  is  mature,  symbols  are  either  given 
up,  or  suffered  to  remain  from  their  harmlessness. .  . . 


IS    VIRTUE    ESSENTIAL    TO    MOKSHA  ?  21 7 

$amkara  did  bow  to  idols,  sometimes  as  symbols  of 
the  great  Infinite,  sometimes  as  symbols  of  lower 
orders  of  beings  in  whom  he  believed.  .  .  .  These 
lower  orders  of  divine  beings,  Brahma,  Vishmi,  Indra, 
Yama,  &c.,  in  whom  he  believed,  are  phenomenal, 
and  subject  to  creation  and  dissolution  as  much  as 
ourselves.'  /Samkara  himself  expresses  this  opinion 
very  clearly  when  (I,  3,  28)  he  says:  'The  gods 
(or  deities)  must  be  admitted  to  be  corporeal,  and 
though  by  their  divine  powers  they  can,  at  one 
and  the  same  time,  partake  of  oblations  offered  at 
numerous  sacrifices,  they  are  still,  like  ourselves, 
subject  to  birth  and  death.' 

If  $amkara  did  not  claim  full  freedom  or  Moksha 
for  himself,  he  did  so,  as  he  says,  for  the  sake  of 
others.  '  If  I,'  he  says,  '  had  not  walked  without 
remission  in  the  path  of  works,  others  would  not 
have  followed  my  steps,  O  Lord ! ' 

Is  Virtue  Essential  to  Moksha? 

Another  question  which  has  been  hotly  contested 
both  in  India  and  in  Europe  is  whether  Moksha  can 
be  the  result  of  knowledge  only,  or  whether  it 
requires  a  fulfilment  of  moral  duties  also l.  Though, 
as  far  as  I  understand  $amkara,  knowledge  alone  can 
in  the  end  lead  to  Moksha,  virtue  is  certainly  pre- 
supposed. It  is  the  same  question  which  meets  us 
with  regard  to  the  Buddhist  Nirva/ia.  This  also  was 
in  the  beginning  the  result  and  the  reward  of  moral 
virtue,  of  the  restraint  of  passions  and  of  perfect 
tranquillity  of  soul,  such  as  we  find  it  described,  for 


1   See  Moksha  or  the  Vedantic  Release,  by  Divyadas  Datta, 
Journal  of  the  R.  A.  S.,  vol.  xx,  part  4. 


2l8  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

instance,  in  the  Dhammapada ;  but  it  soon  assumed 
a  different  character,  as  representing  freedom  from 
all  bondage  and  illusion,  amounting  to  a  denial 
of  all  reality  in  the  objective,  and  likewise  in  the 
subjective  world.  There  are  a  few  traces  left 
in  the  Upanishads,  showing  that  virtue  was  con- 
sidered an  essential  preliminary  of  Moksha.  In 
the  Ka#7ia  Upanishad  II,  i,  which  is  generally  quoted 
for  that  purpose,  we  read :  '  The  good  is  one  thing, 
the  pleasant  another ;  these  two  having  different 
objects  chain  a  man.  It  is  well  with  him,  if  he 
clings  to  the  good  ;  but  he  who  chooses  the  pleasant, 
misses  his  end.  The  good  and  the  pleasant  approach 
a  man  ;  the  wise  goes  round  about  them  and  distin- 
guishes them.  Yea,  the  wise  prefers  the  good  to  the 
pleasant,  but  the  fool  chooses  the  pleasant  through 
greed  and  avarice.'  But  even  in  this  passage  we 
are  not  told  that  virtue  or  self-denial  by  itself  could 
secure  Moksha  or  perfect  freedom ;  nay,  if  we  only 
read  a  few  lines  further,  we  see  :  '  Wide  apart  and 
leading  to  different  points  are  those  two,  ignorance 
(Avidya)  and  what  is  known  as  wisdom  (Vidya).' 
And  Na/tiketas  is  praised  because  he  desires  know- 
ledge, and  is  not  tempted  away  from  it  by  pleasure. 
Still  less  convincing  are  passages  taken  from  the 
Bhagavad-gita,  a  work  which  was  meant  to  present 
different  views  of  Moksha.  All  of  them,  no  doubt, 
though  they  do  not  explicitly  say  so,  presuppose 
high  morality  on  the  part  of  the  candidate,  so  that 
Ar</una  is  made  to  say  for  himself:— 

G'uniimi  dharmam,  na  //a  me  pravn'ttiA, 
G'anamy  adharmam,  na  /ra  me  mvritti/t, 

\\lnc\i  has  been  somewhat  freely  translated  :   '  For 


IS    VIRTUE    ESSENTIAL    TO    MOKSHA  ?  2 19 

what  I  would  that  I  do  not,  but  what  I  hate  that 
do  I/ 

That  later  treatises,  such  as  the  Pan/t-adasi, 
should  lay  great  stress  on  the  religious  and  moral 
side  of  Moksha  is  quite  compatible  with  what  has 
been  maintained  before,  that  Moksha  cannot  be 
achieved  by  sacrifices  or  by  moral  conduct,  but  in  the 
end  by  knowledge  only.  Hence  a  prayer  such  as, — 

'  May  such  unchanging  love  as  foolish  people  feel 
for  earthly  pleasures  never  cease  in  my  heart  when 
I  call  upon  Thee  ! ' 

— may  well  be  uttered  by  worshippers  of  Brahma 
or  Isvara,  but  not  by  the  true  Mumukshu,  who 
is  yearning  for  Brahman  and  true  Moksha. 

Even  the  prayer  from  the  BHhad-aranyaka  (I,  3, 

2&)- 

1  Lead  me  from  the  unreal  to  the  real !  Lead 
me  from  darkness  to  light !  Lead  me  from  death  to 
immortality ! ' 

— refers  to  the  lower  knowledge  only,  and  has  for 
its  reward  another  world,  that  is,  the  heaven  world, 
which  will  also  pass  away. 

It  would  not  be  difficult,  no  doubt,  to  produce 
passages  which  declare  that  a  sinful  man  cannot 
obtain  Moksha,  but  that  is  very  different  from 
saying  that  Moksha  can  be  obtained  by  mere 
abstaining  from  sin.  Good  works,  even  merely 
ceremonial  works,  if  performed  from  pure  motives 
and  without  any  hope  of  rewards,  form  an  excellent 
preparation  for  reaching  that  highest  knowledge 
which  it  is  the  final  aim  of  the  Vedanta  to  impart. 
And  thus  we  read  :  '  Brahmanas  seek  to  know  Him 
by  the  study  of  the  Veda,  by  sacrifices,  by  charitable 
gifts'  (Bnh.  Up.  IV,  4,  22). 


220  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

But  when  the  knowledge  of  the  highest  Brahman 
has  once  been  reached  or  is  within  reach,  all  works, 
whether  good  or  bad,  fall  away.  '  The  fetter  of  the 
heart  is  broken,  all  doubts  are  solved,  extinguished 
are  all  his  works,  wThen  He  has  been  beheld  who  is 
both  high  and  low '  (Muwd  Up.  II,  2,  8). 

Hence,  to  imagine  that  true  Moksha  can  be  ob- 
tained by  moral  conduct  alone  is  a  mistake,  while 
there  are  passages  in  the  Upanishads  to  show 
that  some  Vedantists  taught  that  a  man  who  had 
reached  Brahman  and  the  highest  knowledge,  was 
even  in  this  life  above  the  distinction  of  good  and 
evil,  that  is,  could  do  nothing  that  he  considered 
good  and  nothing  that  he  considered  evil.  Danger- 
ous as  this  principle  seems  to  be,  that  whosoever 
knows  Brahman  cannot  sin,  it  is  hardly  more 
dangerous,  if  properly  understood,  than  the  saying 
of  St.  John  (Ep.  I,  v.  68),  that  whosoever  is  born  of 
God,  sinneth  not. 

The  Two  Brahmans. 

It  sometimes  seems  as  if  *S'a??ikara  and  Badarayawa 
had  actually  admitted  not  only  two  kinds  of  know- 
ledge, but  two  Brahmans  also,  Sagu/iam  and  Ni  rgu  n  am, 
with  or  without  qualities,  but  this  would  again  apply 
to  a  state  of  Nescience  or  Avidya  only  ;  and  it  is  in 
this  sense  alone  that  Brahman  also  may  be  said  to  be 
affected  by  Avidya,  nay  to  be  produced  by  Avidya,  not 
by  the  Avidya  of  single  individuals,  but  by  an  Avidya, 
inherent  in  sentient  nature.  The  true  Brahman, 
however,  remains  always  Nirgunam  or  unqualified, 
whatever  we  may  think  about  him;  and  as,  with 
regard  to  Brahman,  to  be  conceived  and  to  be  is  the 
same  thing,  so  likewise,  so  far  as  we  are  concerned, 


THE    TWO    BRAHMANS.  221 

Brahman  is  conceived  by  us  and  becomes  to  us  quali- 
fied, active,  creative  and  personal  through  the  decep- 
tion of  the  same  universal  and  inevitable  Avidya. 
In  the  same  way  the  creation  of  the  world  and  of 
man  is  not  the  work  of  Brahman,  but  the  result 
of  Avidya  and  of  man  while  under  her  sway.  This 
ambiguity  runs  through  the  whole  of  the  Vedanta, 
at  least  according  to  the  interpretation  of  /Samkara. 
It  will  be  seen  how  small  a  step  it  was  from  this 
view  to  another  which  looked  upon  Brahman  itself 
as  affected  by  Avidya,  nay  which  changed  this 
Avidy&  into  a  $akti  or  potentia  of  Brahman,  thus 
lowering  him,  not  raising  him,  to  the  character  of  an 
active  creator.  In  full  reality  Brahman  is  as  little 
affected  by  qualities  as  our  true  Self  is  by  Upadhis 
(conditions),  but  the  same  Nescience  which  clouds  us 
for  a  time,  clouds  ipso  facto  Brahman  also,  Atman 
(6rivatnian)  and  Brahman  being  substantially  one. 
If  the  qualified  Brahman  makes  us,  we,  the  qualified 
Atman,  make  Brahman,  as  our  maker.  Only  we  must 
never  forget  that  all  this  is  illusion,  so  that  in  truth 
we  can  predicate  nothing  of  Brahman  but  Na,  na, 
i.  e.  No,  no  ;  he  is  not  this,  he  is  not  that.  He  is, 
that  is  all  we  can  say,  and  is  more  than  everything 
else.  In  that  sense  Brahman  may  be  called  both 
Sat  and  Asat,  being  and  not  being,  being  in  the 
highest  sense,  not  being,  as  different  from  all  that 
the  world  calls  being  or  true.  If  in  the  later  Upani- 
shads  Brahman  is  called  Sa£-£id-ananda,  '  being, 
perceiving,  and  blessed,'  then  these  three  predicates 
are  in  reality  but  one,  for  he  or  it  could  not  be 
without  perceiving  itself  (esse  est  percipere),  and  he 
or  it  could  not  perceive  himself  or  itself  except  as  in- 
dependent, perfect,  unaffected  and  untrammelled  by 


222  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

anything  else  (Advitiya).  Having  no  qualities,  this 
highest  Brahman  cannot  of  course  be  known  by  pre- 
dicates. It  is  subjective,  and  not  liable  to  any  objec- 
tive attributes.  If  it  knows,  it  can  only  know  itself, 
like  the  sun  that  is  not  lighted,  but  lights  itself.  Our 
knowledge  of  Brahman  also  can  only  be  consciousness 
of  Brahman  as  our  own  subjective  Atman  or  Self. 

It  seems  only  a  concession  to  the  prejudices,  or 
let  us  say,  the  convictions  of  the  people  of  India, 
that  an  ecstatic  perception  of  Brahman  was  allowed 
as  now  and  then  possible  in  a  state  of  trance, 
such  as  the  Yogins  practised  in  ancient,  and  even 
in  modern  times,  though,  strictly  speaking,  this 
perception  also  could  only  be  a  perception  of  the 
Atman  as  identical  with  Brahman.  The  fatal  mis- 
take which  interpreters  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy 
both  in  India  and  Europe  have  made  is  to  represent 
this  absorption  or  recovery  (Samradhanam,  accom- 
plishment) as  an  approach  of  the  individual  soul 
towards  God.  There  can  be  no  such  approach 
where  there  is  identity,  there  can  only  be  recovery 
or  restitution,  a  return,  a  becoming  of  the  soul  of 
what  it  always  has  been,  a  revival  of  its  true 
nature.  Even  Yoga,  as  we  shall  see,  did  not  mean 
technically  union,  nor  Yogin  a  man  united  with  God, 
but  Yoga  is  effort  towards  Nirodha  or  suppression  of 
A'itta  (the  activity  of  thought)  (see  Yoga-Sutras  I,  2). 

We  shall  thus  understand  the  distinction  which 
the  Vedaritists  and  other  Indian  philosophers  also 
make  between  the  Brahman,  TO  oWcoy  6V,  ;uid  the 
Brahman  as  I.svara,  the  personal  God,  worshipped 
under  different  names,  as  creator,  preserver,  and 
dissolver  of  the  universe.  This  Isvara  exists,  just 
as  everything  else  exists,  as  phenomenally  only,  not 


THE    TWO    BKAHMANS.  223 

as  absolutely  real.  Most  important  acts  are  ascribed 
to  him,  and  whatever  he  may  appear  to  be,  he  is 
always  Brahman.  When  personified  by  the  power 
of  Avidy&  or  Nescience,  he  rules  the  world,  though 
it  is  a  phenomenal  world,  and  determines,  though  he 
does  not  cause,  rewards  and  punishments.  These 
are  produced  directly  by  the  acts  themselves.  But 
it  is  He  through  whose  grace  deeds  are  followed  by 
rewards,  and  man  at  last  obtains  true  knowledge  and 
Mukti,  though  this  Mukti  involves  by  necessity  the 
disappearance  of  Isvara  as  a  merely  phenomenal  god. 
It  must  be  clear  to  any  one  who  has  once  mastered 
the  framework  of  the  true  Vedanta-philosophy,  as 
I  have  here  tried  to  explain  it,  that  there  is  really 
but  little  room  in  it  for  psychology  or  kosmology, 
nay  even  for  ethics.  The  soul  and  the  world  both 
belong  to  the  realm  of  things  which  are  not  real,  and 
have  little  if  anything  to  do  with  the  true  Vedanta 
in  its  highest  and  truest  form.  This  consists  in  the 
complete  surrender  of  all  we  are  and  know.  It 
rests  chiefly  on  the  tremendous  synthesis  of  subject 
and  object,  the  identification  of  cause  and  effect,  of 
the  I  and  the  It.  This  constitutes  the  unique 
character  of  the  Vedanta,  unique  as  compared  with 
every  other  philosophy  of  the  world  which  has  not 
been  influenced  by  it,  directly  or  indirectly.  If  we 
have  once  grasped  that  synthesis,  we  know  the 
Vedanta.  All  its  other  teaching  flows  naturally 
from  this  one  fundamental  doctrine ;  and  though  its 
carefully  thought  out  and  worked  out  details  are 
full  of  interest,  they  contain  no  thoughts,  so  entirely 
new  at  the  time  when  they  were  uttered,  as  this 
identity  of  subject  and  object,  or  this  complete 
absorption  of  the  object  by  this  subject. 


224  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Philosophy  and  Religion. 

It  is  interesting  to  see  how  this  very  bold  philo- 
sophy of  the  Vedanta  was  always  not  only  tolerated, 
but  encouraged  and  patronised  by  religion  and  by 
its  recognised  representatives.  Nor  did  the  Vedanta 
as  a  philosophy  interfere  with  popular  religion  ;  on 
the  contrary,  it  accepted  all  that  is  taught  about 
the  gods  in  the  hymns  and  in  the  Brahma^as,  and 
recommended  a  number  of  sacrificial  and  ceremonial 
acts  as  resting  on  the  authority  of  these  hymns  and 
Brahmawas.  They  were  even  considered  as  a  neces- 
sary preliminary  to  higher  knowledge.  The  creation 
of  the  world,  though  not  the  making  of  it,  was  ac- 
cepted as  an  emanation  from  Brahman,  to  be  followed 
in  great  periods  by  a  taking  back  of  it  into  Brahman. 
The  individual  souls  also  were  supposed,  at  the  end 
of  each  Kalpa,  to  be  drawn  back  into  Brahman,  but, 
unless  entirely  liberated,  to  break  forth  again  and 
again  at  the  beginning  of  every  new  Kalpa. 

Karman. 

The  individual  souls,  so  far  as  they  can  claim  any 
reality,  date,  we  are  told,  from  all  eternity,  and  not 
from  the  day  of  their  birth  on  earth.  They  are  clothed 
in  their  Upadhis  (conditions)  according  to  the  merit 
or  demerit  which  they  have  acquired  by  their  former, 
though  long-forgotten,  acts.  Here  we  perceive  the 
principal  moral  element  in  the  ancient  Vedanta,  so 
far  as  it  is  meant  for  practical  life  ;  and  this  doctrine 
of  Karman  or  deed,  to  which  we  alluded  before, 
has  remained  to  the  present  day,  and  lias  leavened 
the  whole  of  India,  whether  it  was  under  the 
sway  of  Brahmans  or  of  Buddhists.  The  whole 


KARMAN.  225 

world,  such  as  it  is,  is  the  result  of  acts  ;  the 
character  and  fate  of  each  man  are  the  result  of  his 
acts  in  this  or  in  a  former  life,  possibly  also  of  the 
acts  of  others.  This  is  with  them  the  solution  of 
what  we  venture  to  call  the  injustice  of  God.  It 
is  their  Theodicee.  A  man  who  suffers  and  suffers, 
as  we  say,  unjustly,  seems  to  them  but  paying  off 
a  debt  or  laying  up  capital  for  another  life.  A  man 
who  enjoys  health  and  wealth  is  made  to  feel  that 
he  is  spending  more  than  he  has  earned,  and  that  he 
has  therefore  to  make  up  his  debt  by  new  efforts. 
It  cannot  be  by  a  Divine  caprice  that  one  man  is 
born  deaf  or  dumb  or  blind,  another  strong  and 
healthy.  It  can  be  the  result  of  former  acts  only, 
whether,  in  this  life,  the  doer  of  them  is  aware 
of  them  or  not.  It  is  not  even  necessarily  a  punish- 
ment, it  may  be  a  reward  in  disguise.  It  might 
seem  sometimes  as  if  Avidya  too,  which  is  answer- 
able for  the  whole  of  this  phenomenal  world,  had 
to  be  taken  as  the  result  of  acts  far  back  before  the 
beginning  of  all  things.  But  this  is  never  clearly 
stated.  On  the  contrary,  this  primeval  Avidy&  is 
left  unexplained,  it  is  not  to  be  accounted  for  as 
little  as  Brahman  can  be  accounted  for.  Like 
Brahman  it  has  to  be  accepted  as  existent ;  but  it 
differs  from  Brahman  in  so  far  as  it  can  be  destroyed 
by  Vidya,  which  is  the  eternal  life-spring  of  Brahman. 
The  merit  which  can  be  acquired  by  man  even  in 
this  state  of  Avidya  is  such  that  he  may  rise  even  to 
the  status  of  a  god,  though  for  a  time  only,  for  at  the 
end  of  a  Kalpa  even  gods  like  Indra  and  the  rest 
have  to  begin  their  career  afresh.  In  fact  it  might 
be  said  with  some  truth  that  Avidya  is  the  cause  of 
everything,  except  of  Brahman  ;  but  that  the  cause 

Q 


226  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  that  primeval  Avidy4  is  beyond  our  powers  of 
conception. 


Brahman  is  Everything. 

These  powers  of  conception  are  real  indeed  for  all 
practical  purposes,  but  in  the  highest  sense  they  too 
are  phenomenal  only.  They  too  are  but  Nama- 
rupa,  name  and  form  ;  and  the  reality  that  lies 
behind  them,  the  Atman  that  receives  them,  is 
Brahman  and  nothing  else.  This  might  become 
clearer  if  we  took  Brahman  for  the  Kantian  Ding 
an  sich,  remembering  only  that,  according  to  the 
Kantian  philosophy,  the  Rupa,  the  forms  of  intuition 
and  the  categories  of  thought,  though  subjective,  are 
accepted  as  true,  while  the  Vedanta  treats  them  also 
as  the  result  of  Nescience,  though  true  for  all  prac- 
tical purposes  in  this  phenomenal  life.  In  this  sense 
the  Vedarita  is  more  sceptical  or  critical  than  even 
Kant's  critical  philosophy,  though  the  two  agree  with 
each  other  again  when  we  remember  that  Kant  also 
denies  the  validity  of  these  forms  of  perception  and 
thought  when  applied  to  transcendent  subjects. 
According  to  Kant  it  is  man  who  creates  the  worldr 
as  far  as  its  form  (Namarupa)  is  concerned  ;  ac- 
cording to  the  Vedanta  this  kind  of  creation  is  due 
to  Avidya.  And  strange  as  it  may  sound  to  apply 
that  name  of  Avidya  to  Kant's  intuitions  of  sense 
and  his  categories  of  the  understanding,  there  is 
a  common  element  in  them,  though  hidden  under 
different  names.  It  would  be  natural  to  suppose 
that  this  Atman  within  had  been  taken  as  a 
part  of  Brahman,  or  as  a  modification  of  Brahman  : 
but  no.  According  to  $a?/<kara  the  world  is,  as 


THE    STHULA-    AND    SUKSHMA-SARIRA.  227 

I  tried  to  show  l  on  a  former  occasion,  the  whole  of 
Brahman  in  all  its  integrity,  and  not  a  part  only ; 
only,  owing  to  Avidya,  wrongly  conceived  and  in- 
dividualised. Here  we  have  in  fact  the  Holenmerian 
theory  of  Plotinus  and  of  Dr.  Henry  More,  antici- 
pated in  India.  If  the  Atman  within  seems,  limited 
like  the  Brahman  when  seen  in  the  objective  world, 
this  is  once  more  due  to  Avidya.  Brahman  ought 
to  be  omnipresent,  omniscient,  and  omnipotent ; 
though  we  know  but  too  well  that  in  ourselves  it  is 
very  far  from  all  this. 

The  Sthftla-  and  Stikshma-sarlra. 

These  are  the  conditions  or  Upadhis  which  consist 
of  Manas,  mind,  Indriyas,  senses,  Pranas,  vital  spirits, 
and  the  $arira,  body,  as  determined  by  the  outward 
world.  This  Vedantic  arrangement  of  our  organic 
structure  and  our  mental  organisation  is  curious, 
but  it  seems  to  have  been  more  or  less  the  common 
property  of  all  Indian  philosophers,  and  supplied  by 
the  common  language  of  the  people.  What  is 
peculiar  in  it  is  the  admission  of  a  central  organ, 
receiving  and  arranging  what  has  been  conveyed  to 
it  by  the  separate  organs  of  sense.  We  have  no 
word  corresponding  to  it,  though  with  proper  limi- 
tations we  may  continue  to  translate  it  by  mens  or 
mind.  It  would  represent  perception  as  uniting 
and  arranging  the  great  mass  of  sensations,  but  it 
includes  besides  Upalabdhi,  perception,  Adhyavasaya, 
determination,  also,  so  far  as  it  depends  on  a 
previous  interaction  of  percepts.  Hence  a  man  is 
said  to  see  by  the  mind  (Manas,  vovs),  but  he  may 

1  Theosophy,  p.  280. 
Q  2 


228  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

also  be  said  to  decide  and  act  by  the  mind  (Manas). 
All  this  may  seem  very  crude,  leaving  particularly 
the  question  of  the  change  of  mere  sensations  into 
percepts  (Vorstellungeri),  a  subject  so  carefully  elabo- 
rated by  modern  philosophers,  and  of  percepts  into 
concepts,  unapproached  and  unexplained.  Here  the 
philosophy  of  Herbart  would  supply  what  is  wanted. 
He  too,  being  opposed  to  the  admission  of  various 
mental  faculties,  is  satisfied  with  one,  the  Manas,  and 
tries  to  explain  all  psychical  phenomena  whatever 
as  the  result  of  the  action  and  interaction  of  elemen- 
tary Vorstellungen  (ideas  or  presentations). 

By  the  side  of  the  vital  spirit,  the  Mukhya  Prana, 
we  find  a  fivefold  division  into  Pra/ia,  Upana,  Vyana, 
Samana,  and  Udana,  meaning  originally  forth-,  off-, 
through-,  with-,  and  out-breathing,  but  afterwards 
defined  differently  and  without  much  reference  to  any 
physiological  data.  This  also  is  a  doctrine  common 
to  most  systems  of  Indian  philosophy,  though  it  is 
difficult  to  see  by  what  physiological  observations 
it  could  have  been  suggested. 

What  is  more  interesting  is  the  distinction  between 
the  Sthula-  and  Sukshma-sarira,  the  coarse  and  the 
fine  body,  the  former  the  visible  outward  body  ;  the 
latter  invisible  and  consisting  of  Mukhya  Prtuza,  vital 
spirit,  Manas,  mind,  and>  Indriyas,  organs  of  sense. 
This  body  is  supposed  to  remain  after  death,  while 
the  outer  body  is  dissolved  into  its  material  elements. 
The  thin  or  subtle  body,  though  transparent  or 
invisible,  is  nevertheless  accepted  as  material ;  and 
it  is  this  Sukshma-.sarira  which  is  supposed  to 
migrate  after  death  from  world  to  world,  but,  for 
the  most  part,  in  an  unconscious  state.  It  is  not 
like  a  human  body  with  arms  and  legs. 


ESCHATOLOGY. 


The  Four  States. 

Here  again  we  come  across  an  original  idea  of 
Indian  philosophy,  the  doctrine  of  the  four  states, 
the  state  of  being  awake,  the  state  of  dreaming,  the 
state  of  deep  and  dreamless  sleep,  to  which  is  added 
as  the  fourth,  the  state  of  death.  In  the  first  state 
the  Atman  is  supposed  to  be  perceiving  and  acting 
by  means  of  the  Manas  and  the  Indriyas.  In  the 
second  the  Indriyas  cease  to  act,  but  the  Manas 
remains  active,  and  the  Atman,  joined  to  the  Manas, 
moves  through  the  veins  of  the  body  and  sees 
dreams  made  out  of  the  remnants  of  former  impres- 
sions (Vasanas).  The  third  state  arises  from  a  com- 
plete separation  of  Atman  from  Manas  and  Indriyas. 
While  these  are  absorbed  in  the  vital  spirit,  which 
remains  in  full  activity,  the  Atman  in  the  heart  is 
supposed  to  have  for  a  time  become  one  with 
Brahman,  but  to  return  unchanged  at  the  time  of 
awakening.  In  the  fourth  or  disembodied  state 
the  Atman  with  the  Sukshma-sarira  is  supposed  to 
escape  from  the  heart  through  a  vein  in  the  head 
or  through  the  hundred  veins  of  the  body,  and  then 
to  take,  according  to  merit  and  knowledge,  different 
paths  into  the  next  life. 

Eschatology. 

Such  fancies  seem  strange  in  systems  of  philo- 
sophy like  the  Vedanta  ;  and,  with  the  full  recog- 
nition of  the  limits  of  human  knowledge,  we  can 
hardly  understand  how  Vedantists  accepted  this 
account  of  the  Sukshma-sarira,  the  circumstances 
attending  the  departure  of  the  soul,  in  fact,  a  com- 
plete Eschatology,  simply  on  the  authority  of  the 
Veda.  It  is  taken  over  from  the  Upanishads, 


230  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  that  may  be  the  excuse  for  it.  Vedantists 
had  once  for  all  bound  themselves  to  accept  the 
Upanishads  as  revealed  truth,  and  the  usual  result 
followed.  But  we  should  see  clearly  that,  while 
much  may  be  taken  over  from  the  Veda  as  due  to 
Avidya,  we  are  here  really  moving  in  an  Avidya 
within  that  Avidya.  For  practical  purposes  Avidya 
may  often  be  called  common  sense,  under  its  well- 
understood  limitations,  or  the  wisdom  of  the  world. 
But  these  dreams  about  the  details  of  a  future  life 
are  a  mere  phantasmagoria.  They  cannot  even  be 
treated  as  Naisargika,  or  inevitable.  They  are  simply 
Mithyagwana,  fanciful  or  false  knowledge,  if  not 
that  which  is  commonly  illustrated  by  the  son  of 
a  barren  woman — that  is,  a  self-contradictory  state- 
ment— that  kind  at  least  which  is  unsupported  by 
any  evidence,  such  as  the  horn  of  a  hare.  This  is 
really  a  weakness  that  runs  through  the  whole  of 
the  Vedanta,  and  cannot  be  helped.  After  the 
supreme  and  superhuman  authority  of  the  Word 
or  of  the  Veda  had  once  been  recognised,  a  great 
portion  of  the  sacred  traditions  of  the  Vedic  age, 
incorporated  as  they  are  in  the  hymns,  the  Brah- 
manas,  and  the  Upanishads,  had  to  be  accepted  with 
the  rest,  though  accepted  as  part  of  the  Apara  Vidya, 
the  lower  knowledge  only.  All  the  sacrificial  rules, 
nay  the  very  conception  of  a  sacrifice,  had  no  place 
in  the  Para  Vidya,  or  the  highest  knowledge,  because 
they  involved  an  actor  and  an  enjoyer  of  the  fruits 
of  such  acts,  and  the  truly  enlightened  man  cannot 
be  either  an  actor  or  an  enjoyer l.  However,  as 
a  preparation,  as  a  means  of  subduing  the  passions 

1  See  (Sawkara's  Introduction  to  the  Aitareyu  Upanishad. 


ESCHATOLOGY.  23! 

and  purifying  the  mind  by  drawing  it  away  from 
the  low  and  vulgar  interests  of  life,  all  such  com- 
mandments, together  with  the  promises  of  rewards 
vouchsafed  to  them,  might  perhaps  have  been  toler- 
ated. But  when  we  come  to  a  full  description  of 
the  stations  on  the  road  by  which  the  subtle  body 
is  supposed  to  travel  from  the  veins  of  this  body  to 
the  very  steps  of  the  golden  throne  of  the  Lower 
Brahman,  we  wonder  at  the  long  suffering  of  the 
true  philosopher  who  has  learnt  that  the  true  and 
highest  knowledge  of  the  Vedanta  removes  in  the 
twinkling  of  an  eye  (Apatata^)  the  veil  that  in  this 
life  seems  to  separate  Atman  from  Brahman.  As 
these  eschatological  dreams  have  been  included  in 
the  Vedanta  system,  they  had  to  be  mentioned 
here,  though  they  are  better  studied  in  the  pages 
of  the  Upanishads. 

We  are  told  there  that,  in  the  case  of  persons 
who  have  fulfilled  their  religious  or  sacrificial  duties 
and  have  lived  a  good  life,  but  have  not  yet  reached 
the  highest  knowledge,  the  subtle  body  in  which 
the  Atman  is  clothed  migrates,  carried  along  by  the 
Udana  through  the  Murdhanya  Nac?i,  the  capital 
vein,  following  either  the  path  of  the  fathers 
(PitHyana)  or  the  path  of  the  gods  (Devayana). 
The  former  is  meant  for  good  people,  the  latter  for 
those  who  are  good  and  have  already  reached  the 
lower,  if  not  the  highest  knowledge.  The  former 
leads  on  to  smoke,  night,  the  waning  moon,  the 
waning  year,  the  world  of  the  fathers,  the  ether, 
and  lastly  the  moon.  In  the  moon  the  departed 
souls  remain  for  a  time  enjoying  the  rewards  of 
their  good  deeds,  in  company  with  the  Pit?^'s,  and 
then  descend  again,  supported  by  the  remnant  of 


232  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

unrewarded  merit  due  to  their  good  works,  to  the 
ether,  wind,  smoke,  cloud,  rain,  and  plants.  From 
the  plants  springs  seed  which,  when  matured  in  the 
womb,  begins  a  new  life  on  earth  in  such  a  station 
as  the  rest  of  his  former  deeds  (Anusaya),  Anlage, 
may  warrant.  As  this  is,  as  far  as  I  know,  the  earliest 
allusion  to  metempsychosis  or  Seelenwanderung,  it 
may  be  of  interest  to  see  in  what  sense  $arakara 
in  his  commentary  on  Sutra  III,  1,22  took  it  *  ;— 

'  It  has  been  explained,'  he  says,  '  that  the  souls 
of  those  who  perform  sacrifices,  &c.,  after  having 
reached  the  moon,  dwell  there  as  long  as  their 
works  last,  and  then  redescend  with  a  remainder  of 
their  good  works.  We  now  have  to  inquire  into 
the  mode  of  that  descent.  On  this  point  the  Veda 
makes  the  following  statement :  "  They  return  again 
the  way  they  came  to  the  ether,  from  the  ether  to  the 
air  (wind).  Then  the  sacrificer  having  become  air 
becomes  smoke,  having  become  smoke  he  becomes 
mist,  having  become  mist  he  becomes  a  cloud, 
having  become  a  cloud  he  falls  down  as  rain." 
Here  a  doubt  arises  whether  the  descending  souls 
pass  over  into  a  state  of  identity  (Sabhavyam)  with 
ether,  &c.,  or  into  a  state  of  similarity  (Samyam) 
only.  The  Purvapakshin  (opponent)  maintains  that 
the  state  is  one  of  identity,  because  this  is  directly 
stated  by  the  text.  Otherwise  there  would  take 
place  what  is  called  indication  only  (Lakshana,  i.  e. 
secondary  application  of  a  word),  and  whenever  the 
doubt  lies  between  a  directly  expressed  and  a  merely 
indicated  meaning,  the  former  is  to  be  preferred. 
Thus  the  following  words  also,  "Having  become  air 

!  S.B.E.,  vol.  xxxvii,  Thibuut's  translation. 


ESCHATOLOGY.  233 

he  becomes  smoke,"  &c.5  are  appropriate  only  if  the 
soul  be  understood  to  identify  itself  with  them. 
Hence  it  follows  that  the  souls  (of  the  departed) 
become  really  identical  with  ether.  To  this  we 
($awkara)  reply  that  they  only  pass  into  a  state 
of  similarity  to  ether,  &c.  When  the  body,  con- 
sisting of  water  which  the  soul  had  assumed  in  the 
sphere  of  the  moon  for  the  purpose  of  enjoyment, 
dissolves  at  the  time  when  that  enjoyment  comes 
to  an  end,  then  it  becomes  subtle  like  ether,  passes 
thereupon  into  the  power  of  the  air,  and  then  gets 
mixed  with  smoke,  &c.  This  is  the  meaning  of  the 
clauses,  "  They  return  as  they  came  to  the  ether, 
from  the  ether  to  the  air,"  &c.  How  is  this  known 
to  be  the  meaning  1  Because  thus  only  is  it  possible. 
For  it  is  not  possible  that  one  thing  should  become 
another  in  the  literal  sense  of  the  word.  If,  moreover, 
the  souls  became  identified  with  ether,  they  could 
no  longer  descend  through  the  air.  And  as  con- 
nection with  the  ether  is,  on  account  of  its  all- 
pervadingness,  eternal,  no  other  connection  (of  the 
souls)  with  it  can  here  be  meant,  but  their  entering 
into  a  state  of  similarity  to  it.  In  cases  where  it  is 
impossible  to  accept  the  literal  meaning  of  the  text, 
it  is  quite  proper  to  assume  the  meaning  which  is 
merely  indicated.  For  these  reasons  the  souls'  be- 
coming ether,  &c.,  has  to  be  taken  in  the  secondary 
sense  of  their  passing  into  a  state  of  similarity  to 
ether,  and  so  on.' 

We  see  from  this  that  $amkara  believed  in  a 
similarity  only,  an  outward  and  temporary  similarity 
between  the  departed  (in  its  Sukshma-sarira)  and 
the  ether,  air,  mist,  cloud,  and  rain ;  and  it  is  im- 
portant to  observe  how,  in  doing  so,  he  violently 


234  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

twisted  the  natural  meaning  of  Sabhavya,  the  word 
used  in  the  Sutras,  rather  than  altering  a  word  of 
the  Sutra,  and  replacing  Sabhavyam  by  Samyara. 

A  similar  difficulty  arises  again  when  it  has  to 
be  determined  whether  the  departed,  in  his  further 
descent,  actually  becomes  a  plant,  such  as  rice,  corn, 
sesamum,  beans,  &c.,  or  becomes  merely  connected 
with  them.  /Samkara  decides  strongly  in  favour  of 
the  latter  view,  though  here  again  the  actual  words 
of  the  Sutra  have  certainly  to  be  twisted  by  him  ; 
nay,  though  £amkara  himself  has  to  admit  that 
other  people  may  really,  on  account  of  their  bad 
deeds,  sink  so  low  as  to  become  plants.  He  only 
denies  this  with  reference  to  the  departed  who,  on 
account  of  their  pious  works,  have  already  reached 
the  moon,  and  are  after  that  redescending  upon 
earth. 

Lastly,  if  it  is  said  that  the  plant,  when  eaten,  be- 
comes a  progenitor,  this  also,  according  to  $amkara, 
can  only  mean  that  it  is  joined  with  a  progenitor. 
For  the  progenitor  must  exist  long  before  he  eats 
the  rice  or  the  beans,  and  is  able  to  beget  a  child. 
Anyhow,  the  child  when  begotten  is  the  soul  that 
had  ascended  to  and  descended  from  the  moon,  and 
is  born  again  according  to  his  former  works. 

I  must  confess  that,  though  the  Vedantists  may 
be  bound  by  *S'a?»kara's  interpretation,  it  seems  to 
me  as  if  the  author  of  the  Sutras  himself  had  taken 
a  different  view,  arid  had  looked  throughout  on  ether, 
air,  mist,  cloud,  rain,  plants  as  the  habitat,  though 
the  temporary  habitat  only,  of  the  departed  in  their 
subtle  body1. 


1  See  Vishwu  Dh.  S.  XLIII,  45. 


ESCHATOLOGY.  235 

Little  is  said  in  the  Upanishads  of  those  who, 
owing  to  their  evil  deeds,  do  not  even  rise  to  the 
moon  and  descend  again.  But  Badaraya?ia  tries  to 
make  it  clear  that  the  Upanishads  know  of  a  third 
class  of  beings  (III,  i,  12)  who  reap  the  fruits  of 
their  evil  actions  in  Samyamana  (abode  of  Yama) 
and  then  ascend  to  earth  again.  Theirs  is  the  third 
place  alluded  to  in  the  jKMnd.  Upanishad  V,  10,  8. 

But  while  evil  doers  are  thus  punished  in  different 
hells,  as  mentioned  in  the  Puranas,  and  while  pious 
people  are  fully  rewarded  in  the  moon  and  then 
return  again  to  the  earth,  those  who  have  been 
pious  and  have  also  reached  at  least  the  lower 
knowledge  of  Brahman  follow  a  different  road. 
After  leaving  the  body,  they  enter  the  flame,  the 
day,  the  waxing  moon,  the  waxing  year  (northern  pre- 
cession), the  year,  the  world  of  the  Devas,  the  world 
of  Vayu,  air,  the  sun,  the  moon,  and  then  lightning  ; 
but  all  these,  we  are  told,  are  not  abodes  for  the  soul, 
but  guides  only  who,  when  the  departed  has  reached 
the  lightning,  hand  him  over  to  a  person  who  is 
said  to  be  not-a-man.  This  person  conducts  him 
to  the  world  of  Varuna,  then  to  that  of  Indra,  and 
lastly  to  that  of  Pra^apati  or  the  qualified  Brahma. 
Here  the  souls  are  supposed  to  remain  till  they 
realise  true  knowledge  or  the  Samyagdarsana,  which 
does  not  mean  universal,  but  thorough  and  com- 
plete knowledge,  that  knowledge  which,  if  obtained 
on  earth,  at  once  frees  a  man  from  all  illusion. 
Finally  the  souls,  when  fully  released,  share  in 
all  the  powers  of  Brahman  except  those  of  creating 
and  ruling  the  universe.  They  are  not  supposed 
ever  to  retura  to  t:ie  world  of  Samsara  (IV,  4,  17). 

All  this  is  hardly  to  be  called  philosophy,  neither 


236  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

do  the  different  descriptions  of  the  road  on  which  the 
souls  of  the  pious  are  supposed  to  wander  towards 
Brahma,  and  which  naturally  vary  according  to  dif- 
ferent schools,  help  us  much  towards  a  real  insight 
into  the  Vedanta.  But  it  would  have  been  unfair  to 
leave  out  what,  though  childish,  is  a  characteristic 
feature  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy,  and  must  be 
judged  from  a  purely  historical  point  of  view. 

Freedom  in  this  Life. 

What  is  of  importance  to  remember  in  these 
ancient  fancies  is  that  the  enlightened  man  may 
become  free  or  obtain  Mukti  even  in  this  life  (6rivan- 
mukti 1).  This  is  indeed  the  real  object  of  the 
Vedanta-philosophy,  to  overcome  all  Nescience,  to 
become  once  more  what  the  Atman  always  has  been, 
namely  Brahman,  and  then  to  wait  till  death  removes 
the  last  Upadhis  or  fetters,  which,  though  they 
fetter  the  mind  no  longer,  remain  like  broken  chains 
hanging  heavy  on  the  mortal  body.  The  Atman, 
having  recovered  its  Brahmahood,  is  even  in  this 
life  so  free  from  the  body  that  it  feels  no  longer  any 
pain,  and  cannot  do  anything,  whether  good  or  bad. 
This  has  been  always  laid  hold  of  as  the  most 
dangerous  doctrine  of  Vedantism,  and  no  doubt  it 
may  be  both  misunderstood  and  misapplied.  But 
in  the  beginning  it  meant  no  more  than  that  the 
Atman,  which  is  above  the  distinctions  of  subject 
and  object,  of  past  and  present,  of  cause  and  effect, 
is  also  by  necessity  above  the  distinction  of  good 
and  evil.  This  never  was  intended  as  freedom  in 
the  sense  of  licence,  but  as  freedom  that  can 


1  Vedanta-Sutras  III,  3,  28. 


FREEDOM    IN    THIS    LIFE.  237 

neither  lapse  into  sinful  acts  nor  claim  any  merit 
for  good  acts,  being  at  rest  and  blessed  in  itself  and 
in  Brahman. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  or  to  prove  that  the 
Vedtlnta-philosophy,  even  in  its  popular  form,  holds 
out  no  encouragement  to  vice.  Far  from  it.  No 
one  can  even  approach  it  who  has  not  previously 
passed  through  a  course  of  discipline,  whether  as 
a  student  (Brahma&arin)  or  as  a  householder  (Qri- 
hastha).  In  order  to  make  this  quite  clear,  it  may 
be  useful  to  add  a  few  verses  from  one  of  the  many 
popular  works  intended  to  teach  Vedanta  to  the 
masses.  It  is  called  the  Mohamudgara,  the  Hammer 
of  Folly,  and  is  ascribed  to  $amkara.  Though  not 
strictly  philosophical,  it  may  serve  at  least  to  show 
the  state  of  mind  in  which  the  true  Vedantist  is 
meant  to  maintain  himself.  It  was  carefully  edited 
with  Bengali,  Hindi  and  English  translations  by 
Durga  Das  Ray,  and  published  at  Darjeeling  in  1888. 

'  Fool !  give  up  thy  thirst  for  wealth,  banish  all 
desires  from  thy  heart.  Let  thy  mind  be  satisfied 
with  what  is  gained  by  thy  Karman. 

Who  is  thy  wife  and  who  is  thy  son  ?  Curious 
are  the  ways  of  this  world.  "  Who  art  thou  ? 
Whence  didst  thou  come  ?  Ponder  on  this,  O 
Brother." 

Do  not  be  proud  of  wealth,  of  friends,  or  youth. 
Time  takes  all  away  in  a  moment.  Leaving  all  this 
which  is  full  of  illusion,  leave  quickly  and  enter 
into  the  place  of  Brahman. 

Life  is  tremulous  like  a  water-drop  on  a  lotus-leaf. 
The  company  of  the  good,  though  for  a  moment 
only,  is  the  only  boat  for  crossing  this  ocean  of  the 
world. 


238  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

As  is  birth  so  is  death,  and  so  is  the  dwelling 
in  the  mother's  womb.  Thus  is  manifest  the 
misery  of  the  world.  How  can  there  be  satisfaction 
here  for  thee,  O  Man  ! 

Day  and  night,  morning  and  evening,  winter 
and  spring  come  and  go.  Time  is  playing,  life  is 
waning — yet  the  breath  of  hope  never  ceases. 

The  body  is  wrinkled,  the  hair  grey,  the  mouth 
has  become  toothless,  the  stick  in  the  hand  shakes, 
yet  man  leaves  not  the  anchor  of  hope. 

To  live  under  a  tree  of  the  house  of  the  gods, 
to  sleep  on  the  earth,  to  put  on  a  goat-skin,  to 
abandon  all  worldly  enjoyment  ;  when  does  such 
surrender  not  make  happy  ? 

Do  not  trouble  about  enemy,  friend,  son,  or  rela- 
tion, whether  for  war  or  peace.  Preserve  equanimity 
always,  if  you  desire  soon  to  reach  the  place  of 
Vishnu  (Vistmupada). 

The  eight  great  mountains,  the  seven  oceans, 
Brahma,  Indra,  the  Sun  and  the  Rudras,  thou,  I 
and  the  whole  world  are  nothing  ;  why  then  is  there 
any  sorrow  ? 

In  thee,  in  me,  and  in  others  there  dwells  Vishnu 
alone,  it  is  useless  to  be  angry  with  me  and  im- 
patient. See  every  self  in  Self,  and  give  up  all 
thought  of  difference. 

The  child  is  given  to  play,  the  youth  delights  in 
a  beautiful  damsel,  an  old  man  is  absorbed  in  cares 
—no  one  clings  to  the  Highest  Brahman. 

Consider  wealth  as  useless,  there  is  truly  no  particle 
of  happiness  in  it.  The  rich  are  afraid  even  of  their 
son,  this  is  the  rule  established  everywhere. 

So  long  as  a  man  can  earn  money,  his  family  is 
kind  to  him.  But  when  his  body  becomes  infirm 


DIFFERENT    WAYS    OF    STUDYING    PHILOSOPHY.       239 

through   old  age,  no  man  in  the  house  asks  after 
him. 

Having  given  up  lust,  anger,  avarice,  and  dis- 
traction, meditate  on  thyself,  who  thou  art.  Fools 
without  a  knowledge  of  Self  are  hidden  in  hell  and 
boiled. 

In  these  sixteen  verses  the  whole  teaching  of 
the  disciples  has  been  told.  Those  in  whom  this 
does  not  produce  understanding,  who  can  do  more 
for  them  ? ' 

Different  Ways  of  Studying  Philosophy. 

This  may  not  be  exactly  moral  teaching  as  we 
understand  it.  But  there  are  two  ways  of  studying 
philosophy.  We  may  study  it  in  a  critical  or  in 
a  historical  spirit.  The  critic  would  no  doubt  fasten, 
at  once  on  the  supersession  of  morality  in  the  Vedanta 
as  an  unpardonable  flaw.  One  of  the  corner-stones, 
without  which  the  grandest  pyramid  of  thought 
must  necessarily  collapse,  would  seem  to  be  missing 
in  it.  The  historian  on  the  other  hand  will  be 
satisfied  with  simply  measuring  the  pyramid  or 
trying  to  scale  it  step  by  step,  as  far  as  his 
thoughts  will  carry  him.  He  would  thus  understand 
the  labour  it  has  required  in  building  up,  and 
possibly  discover  some  counteracting  forces  that 
render  the  absence  even  of  a  corner-stone  intelligible, 
pardonable,  and  free  from  danger.  It  is  surely  as- 
tounding that  such  a  system  as  the  Yed^nta  should 
have  been  slowly  elaborated  by  the  indefatigable  and 
intrepid  thinkers  of  India  thousands  of  years  ago,  a 
system  that  even  now  makes  us  feel  giddy,  as  in 
mounting  the  last  steps  of  the  swaying  spire  of  an 
ancient  Gothic  cathedral.  None  of  our  philosophers, 
not  excepting  Heraclitus,  Plato,  Kant,  or  Hegel,  has 


240  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ventured  to  erect  such  a  spire,  never  frightened  by 
storms  or  lightnings.  Stone  follows  on  stone  in 
regular  succession  after  once  the  first  step  has 
been  made,  after  once  it  has  been  clearly  seen  that 
in  the  beginning  there  can  have  been  but  One,  as 
there  will  be  but  One  in  the  end,  whether  we 
call  it  Atman  or  Brahman.  We  may  prefer  to 
look  upon  the  expansion  of  the  world  in  names 
and  forms  as  the  work  of  Sophia  or  as  the  realised 
Logos,  but  we  cannot  but  admire  the  boldness  with 
which  the  Hindu  metaphysician,  impressed  with  the 
miseries  and  evanescence  of  this  world,  could  bring 
himself  to  declare  even  the  Logos  to  be  but  the  result 
of  Avidy:!  or  Nescience,  so  that  in  the  destruction  of 
that  Avidya  could  be  recognised  the  highest  object, 
and  the  summum  bonum  (PurusMrtha)  of  man.  We 
need  not  praise  or  try  to  imitate  a  Colosseum,  but 
if  we  have  any  heart  for  the  builders  of  former  days 
we  cannot  help  feeling  that  it  was  a  colossal  and 
stupendous  effort.  And  this  is  the  feeling  which 
I  cannot  resist  in  examining  the  ancient  Vedanta. 
Other  philosophers  have  denied  the  reality  of  the 
world  as  perceived  by  us,  but  no  one  has  ventured  to 
deny  at  the  same  time  the  reality  of  what  we  call 
the  Ego,  the  senses  and  the  mind,  and  their  inherent 
forms.  And  yet  after  lifting  the  Self  above  body  and 
soul,  after  uniting  heaven  and  earth,  God  and  man, 
Brahman  and  Atman,  these  Vedanta  philosophers 
have  destroyed  nothing  in  the  life  of  the  phenomenal 
beings  who  have  to  act  and  to  fulfil  their  duties  in 
this  phenomenal  world.  On  the  contrary,  they  have 
shown  that  there  can  be  nothing  phenomenal  with- 
out something  that  is  real,  and  that  goodness  and 
virtue,  faith  and  works,  are  necessary  as  a  prepara- 


DIFFERENT    WAYS    OF    STUDYING    PHILOSOPHY.        241 

tion,  nay  as  a  sine  qud  non,  for  the  attainment  of 
that  highest  knowledge  which  brings  the  soul  back 
to  its  source  and  to  its  home,  and  restores  it  to  its 
true  nature,  to  its  true  Selfhood  in  Brahman. 

And  let  us  think  how  keenly  and  deeply  Indian 
thinkers  must  have  felt  the  eternal  riddles  of  this 
world  before  they  could  propose  so  desperate  a  solu- 
tion as  that  of  the  Vedanta;  how  desperate  they  must 
have  thought  the  malady  of  mankind  to  be  before 
they  could  think  of  so  radical  a  cure.  A  student 
of  the  history  of  philosophy  must  brace  himself  to 
follow  those  whom  he  wants  to  reach  and  to  under- 
stand. He  has  to  climb  like  a  mountaineer,  un- 
dismayed by  avalanches  and  precipices.  He  must 
be  able  to  breathe  in  the  thinnest  air,  never  dis- 
couraged even  if  snow  and  ice  bar  his  access  to  the 
highest  point  ever  reached  by  the  boldest  explorers. 
Even  if  he  has  sometimes  to  descend  again,  dis- 
appointed, he  has  at  all  events  strengthened  his 
lungs  and  his  muscles  for  further  work.  He  has 
done  his  athletic  exercise,  and  he  has  seen  views 
such  as  are  never  seen  in  the  valleys  below.  I  am 
myself  not  a  mountaineer,  nor  am  I  altogether  a 
Vedantist ;  but  if  I  can  admire  the  bold  climbers 
scaling  Mount  Gauri-Samkar,  I  can  also  admire 
the  bold  thinkers  toiling  up  to  heights  of  the 
Vedanta  where  they  seem  lost  to  us  in  clouds 
and  sky.  Do  we  imagine  that  these  ascents  were 
undertaken  from  mere  recklessness,  from  mere  love 
of  danger?  It  is  easy  for  us  to  call  those  ancient 
explorers  reckless  adventurers,  or  dispose  of  them 
with  the  help  of  other  names,  such  as  mystic  or 
pantheist,  often  but  half  understood  by  those  who 
employ  them.  The  Vedaritists  have  often  been 

R, 


242  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

called  Atheists,  but  as  the  gods  which  they  denied 
were  only  Devas,  or  what  we  call  false  gods,  they 
might  thus  far  have  been  forgiven.  They  have  been 
called  Pantheists,  though  their  theos,  or  their  theoi, 
were  not  the  Pan,  but  the  Pan  was  their  theos. 
They  have  been  called  Nihilists,  but  they  them- 
selves have  drawn  a  sharp  line  between  the  up- 
holders of  the  $unya-vada  l,  the  emptiness-doctrine, 
and  their  own  teaching,  which,  on  the  contrary,  in- 
sists throughout  on  the  reality  that  underlies  all 
phenomenal  things,  namely  Brahman,  and  inculcates 
the  duties  which  even  this  world  of  seeming  imposes 
on  all  who  are  not  yet  in  possession  of  the  highest 
truth.  That  this  phenomenal  world  has  no  exclusive 
right  to  the  name  of  real  is  surely  implied  by  its 
very  name.  Besides,  whatever  perishes  can  never 
have  been  real.  If  heaven  and  earth  shall  pass 
away  ;  if  we  see  our  body,  our  senses,  and  all  that  has 
been  built  up  on  them,  decaying  and  perishing  every 
day  before  our  very  eyes ;  if  the  very  Ego,  the  Aham, 
is  dissolved  into  the  elements  from  which  it  sprang, 
why  should  not  the  Vedantist  also  have  held  to  his 
belief  that  Brahman  alone  is  really  real,  and  every- 
thing else  a  dream  ;  and  that  even  the  Nama-rupas, 
the  words  and  things,  will  vanish  with  each  Kalpa? 
To  sum  up,  the  Vedanta  teaches  that  in  the 
highest  sense  Creation  is  but  Self-forgetful  ness,  and 
Eternal  Life  remembrance  or  Self-consciousness. 
And  while  to  us  such  high  abstractions  may  seem 
useless  for  the  many,  it  is  all  the  more  surprising 
that,  with  the  Hindus,  the  fundamental  ideas  of  the 

1  An  important  distinction  between  Buddhists  and  Ve- 
dantists  is  that  the  former  hold  the  world  to  have  arisen  from 
what  is  not,  the  latter  from  what  is,  the  Sat  or  Brahman. 


RAMANUOA.  243 

Vedanta  have  pervaded  the  whole  of  their  literature, 
have  leavened  the  whole  of  their  language,  and  form 
to  the  present  day  the  common  property  of  the  people 
at  large.  No  doubt  these  ideas  assume  in  the  streets 
a  different  garment  from  what  they  wear  among  the 
learned  in  the  Asramas  or  the  forests  of  the  country. 
K-Jffay  even  among  the  learned  few  stand  up  for  the 
complete  Advajfca  or  Monism  as  represented  by 
jSamkara. 

The  danger  with  /Samkara's  Vedantism  was  that 
what  to  him  was  simply  phenomenal,  should  be 
taken  for  purely  fictitious.  There  is,  however,  as 
great  a  difference  between  the  two  as  there  is 
between  Avidy^  and  Mithyagwana.  May4  1  is  the 
cause  of  a  phenomenal,  not  of  a  fictitious,  world; 
and  if  $amkara  adopts  the  Vivarta  (turning  away) 
instead  of  the  Parinama  (evolution)  doctrine,  there 
is  always  something  on  which  the  Vivarta  or  illusion 
is  at  work,  and  which  cannot  be  deprived  of  its 
reality. 


There  are  schools  of  Vedantists  who  try  to  explain 
the  Sutras  of  Badarayana  in  a  far  more  human  spirit. 
The  best  known  is  the  school  of  Ramanur/a,  who  lived 
in  the  twelfth  century  A.  D.2  If  we  place  $a???kara's 
literary  activity  about  the  eighth  century3,  the  claim 
of  priority  and  of  prior  authority  would  belong  to 
iSamkara.  But  we  must  never  forget  that  in  India 
more  than  anywhere  else,  philosophy  was  not  the 

1  In  the  only  passage  where  the  Sutras  speak  of  Maya  (III, 
2,  3\  it  need  not  mean  more  than  a  dream. 

2  Wilson,  Works,  I,  p.  35. 

8  I-tsing,     Introduction,     p.    xv,    788-820   A.D.  ;    Kumarila, 
750  A.D. 

R  2 


244  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

property  of  individuals,  but  that,  as  in  the  period  of 
the  Upanishads,  so  in  later  times  also,  everybody 
was  free  to  contribute  his  share.  As  we  find  a 
number  of  teachers  mentioned  in  the  Upanishads, 
and  as  they  give  us  long  lists  of  names,  pupil  suc- 
ceeding teacher  through  more  than  fifty  spiritual 
generations,  the  commentators  also  quote  ever  so 
many  authorities  in  support  of  the  v^ews  which  they 
either  accept  or  reject.  Hence  we  cannot  accept 
/Samkara  as  the  only  infallible  interpreter  of  the 
Vedanta-Sutras,  but  have  to  recognise  in  his  com- 
mentary one  only  of  the  many  traditional  interpreta- 
tions of  the  Sutras  which  prevailed  at  different  times 
in  different  parts  of  India,  and  in  different  schools. 
A  most  important  passage  in  this  respect  is  that  in 
which  ASa??"tkara  has  to  confess  that  others  (apare  tu 
vadina//)  differ  from  him,  and  some,  as  he  adds,  even 
of  our  own  (asmadiyas  £a  ke&it) l.  This  allows  us 
a  fresh  insight  into  the  philosophical  life  of  India 
which  is  worth  a  great  deal,  particularly  as  the 
difference  of  opinion  refers  to  a  fundamental  doctrine, 
namely  the  absolute  identity  of  the  individual  soul 
with  Brahman.  iSamkara,  as  we  saw,  was  uncom- 
promising on  that  point.  With  him  and,  as  he  thinks, 
with  Badaraya?za  also,  no  reality  is  allowed  to  the 
soul  (Atman)  as  an  individual  (Criva),  or  to  the  world 
as  presented  to  and  by  the  senses.  With  him  the 
soul's  reality  is  Brahman,  and  Brahman  is  one  only. 
But  others,  he  adds,  allow  reality  to  the  individual 
souls  also.  Now  this  is  the  very  opinion  on  which 
another  philosopher,  Ilamfmur/a,  has  based  his  own 
interpretation  of  Bddarayana's  Sutras,  and  has 


1  S.B.E.,  XXXIV,  p.  xx,  Thibaut. 


RAMANU&A.  245 

founded  a  large  and  influential  sect.  But  it  does 
not  follow  that  this,  whether  heretical  or  orthodox 
opinion,  was  really  first  propounded  by  Ramanu^a, 
for  Ramanucfa  declares  himself  dependent  on  former 
teachers  (Pur vaMry aA),  and  appeals  particularly  to 
a  somewhat  prolix  Sutra- vritti  by  Bodhayana  as  his 
authority.  Ramanu^a l  himself  quotes  not  only 
Bodhayana,  but  after  him  Tanka,  Dramic?a  (or 
Dravic/a),  Guhadeva,  Kapardin,  BharuH.  One  of 
them,  Dravicfa,  is  expressly  said  to  have  been  anterior 
to  $a»ikara,  and  so  must  Bodhayana  have  been,  if 
he  is  meant  by  the  Vrittikara  whom  $amkara  him- 
self criticises  -. 

We  ought,  therefore,  to  look  on  Ramanu^a  as  a 
perfect  equal  of  /Samkara,  so  far  as  his  right  of  in- 
terpreting Badarayana's  Sutras,  according  to  his  own 
opinion,  is  concerned.  It  is  the  same  here  as  every- 
where in  Hindu  philosophy.  The  individual  philo- 
sopher is  but  the  mouthpiece  of  tradition,  and  that 
tradition  goes  back  further  and  further,  the  more 
we  try  to  fix  it  chronologically.  While  $a/?ikara's 
system  is  Advaita,  i.e.  absolute  Monism,  that  of 
RamamK/a  has  been  called  Visish^a- Advaita,  the 
doctrine  of  unity  with  attributes  or  Monism  with  a 
difference.  Of  course  with  Ramanur/a  also  Brahman 
is  the  highest  reality,  omnipotent,  omniscient,  but 
this  Brahman  is  at  the  same  time  full  of  compassion 
or  love.  This  is  a  new  and  very  important  feature 
in  Ramanuir/a's  Brahman,  as  compared  with  the  icy 
self-sufficiency  ascribed  to  Brahman  by  $amkara. 
Even  more  important  and  more  humanising  is  the 

3  S.B.E.,  XXXIV,  p.  xxi. 

2  Deussen,  The  Vedanta-Philosophy,  p.  31. 


246  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

recognition  that  souls  as  individuals  possess  reality, 
that  Kit  and  A/lit,  what  perceives  and  what  does  not 
perceive,  soul  and  matter,  form,  as  it  were,  the  body 
of  Brahman l,  are  in  fact  modes  (Prakara)  of  Brahman. 
Sometimes  Kit  is  taken  for  the  Supreme  Spirit  as 
a  conscious  cause,  AHt  for  the  unconscious  effect  or 
matter ;  but  there  is  always  Isvara  as  a  third,  the 
Lord  ;  and  this,  originally  Brahma,  is  later  on  iden- 
tified without  much  ado  with  Vislmu,  so  that 
Raman  w/a's  sect  is  actually  called  $ri-Vaistmava. 
It  assumed  no  doubt  the  greatest  importance  as  a 
religious  sect,  as  teaching  people  how  to  live  rather 
than  how  to  think.  But  to  us  its  chief  interest  is 
its  philosophical  character,  and  more  particularly  its 
relation  to  the  Badarayana-Sutras  and  $arakara's 
explanation  of  them. 

Brahman,  whether  under  the  name  of  Isvara, 
Vishnu  or  Vasudeva,  or  Bhagavat,  is  with  Ramanuf/a 
as  with  $a??ikara  both  the  efficient  and  the  material 
cause  of  all  that  exists,  and  he  is  likewise  the  lord 
and  ruler  of  the  world.  But  here  mythology  comes  in 
at  once.  From  this  Brahman,  according  to  Ramanu^a, 
spring  Samkarshana,  the  individual  soul  ((7iva),  from 
Samkarshana  Pradyumna,  mind  (Manas),  and  from 
Pradyumna  Aniruddha  or  the  Ego  (Aharikara). 
Brahma,  masc.,  here  called  Vasudeva,  is  not  without 
qualities,  as  >Samkara  holds,  but  possesses  (7/kina 
(knowledge), $akti  (energy),  Bala  (strength),  Aisvarya 
(supreme  power),  Virya  (vigour),  and  Te^as  (energy), 
as  his  Gu?tas  or  qualities.  Much  more  of  the  same 
kind  may  be  found  in  Colebrooke  2. 


1  Colebrooke,  Misc.  Essays,  I,  439  n. 

2  Ibid.,  I,  p.  439. 


RAMANUGA.  247 

The  real  philosophical  character  of  Ramanw/a's 
Vedantism  has  for  the  first  time  been  placed  in  its 
true  light  by  Professor  Thibaut,  from  whom  we  may 
soon  expect  a  complete  translation  of  Ramanw/a's 
own  commentary  on  the  Vedanta-Sutras,  the  Sri- 
bhashya.  As,  according  to  Ramanugra,  Brahman  is 
not  Nirguna,  without  qualities,  such  qualities  as 
intelligence,  power,  and  mercy  are  ascribed  to  him, 
while  with  /Samkara  even  intelligence  was  not  a 
quality  of  Brahman,  but  Brahman  was  intelligence, 
pure  thought,  and  pure  being.  Besides  these 
qualities,  Brahman  is  supposed  to  possess,  as  con- 
stituent elements,  the  material  world  and  the  indi- 
vidual souls,  and  to  act  as  the  inward  ruler  (Antar- 
yamin)  of  them.  Hence,  neither  the  world  nor  the 
individual  souls  will  ever  cease  to  exist.  All  that 
Ramanu</a  admits  is  that  they  pass  through  different 
stages  as  Avyakta  and  Vyakta.  As  Vyakta,  de- 
veloped, they  are  what  we  know  them  to  be  on 
earth  ;  as  Avyakta  they  are  enveloped  (SamkoHta). 
This  involution  takes  place  at  the  end  of  each  Kalpa, 
when  Brahman  assumes  its  causal  state  (Karana- 
vastha),  and  when  individual  souls  and  individual 
things  lose  for  a  time  their  distinct  and  independent 
character.  Then  follows,  by  the  mere  will  of  Brahma, 
the  evolution,  or  the  new  creation  of  gross  and  visible 
matter,  and  an  assumption  by  the  individual  souls 
of  new  material  bodies,  according  to  the  merit  or 
demerit  of  their  former  existence.  The  important 
point  is  that  the  individual  souls,  according  to 
Ramanuf/a,  retain  their  individuality  even  when  they 
have  reached  the  blissful  abode  of  Brahman.  The 
world  is  not  considered  by  him  as  merely  the  result 
of  Avidya,  but  is  real,  while  Brahman  is  to  be  looked 


248  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

upon  and  worshipped  as  a  personal  god,  the  creator 
and  ruler  of  a  real  world.  Thus  Isvara,  the  Lord,  is 
not  to  be  taken  as  a  phenomenal  god  ;  and  the  differ- 
ence between  Brahman  and  Isvara  vanishes,  as  much 
as  the  difference  between  a  qualified  and  an  un- 
qualified Brahman,  between  a  higher  and  a  lower 
knowledge.  Here  we  perceive  the  influence  exercised 
on  philosophy  by  the  common  sense  or  the  common 
sentiment  of  the  people.  In  other  countries  in  which 
philosophy  is,  as  it  were,  the  private  property  of 
individual  thinkers,  that  influence  is  far  less  per- 
ceptible. But  extreme  views  like  those  propounded 
by  /Samkara  were,  as  might  be  expected,  too  much 
for  the  great  mass  of  the  people,  who  might  be  will- 
ing to  accept  the  doctrines  of  the  Upanishads  in 
their  vagueness,  but  who  would  naturally  shrink 
from  the  conclusions  drawn  from  them  with  in- 
exorable consistency  by  >Sa??ikara.  If  it  is  impossible 
to  say,  as  >Samkara  says,  '  I  am  not,'  it  is  difficult  at 
least  to  say,  'I  am  not  I,'  but  'I  am  Brahman.'  It  may 
be  possible  to  say  that  Isvara  or  the  Lord  is  Brahman  ; 
but  to  worship  Isvara,  and  to  be  told  at  the  same 
time  that  Isvara  is  but  phenomenal,  must  be  trying 
even  to  the  most  ardent  of  worshippers.  If  there- 
fore Ramanur/a,  while  professing  his  faith  in  the 
Upanishads  and  his  allegiance  to  Badaraya^a,  could 
give  back  to  his  followers  not  only  their  own  souls, 
but  a] so  a  personal  god,  no  wonder  that  his  success 
should  have  been  so  great  as  it  was. 

In  the  absence  of  any  definite  historical  materials 
it  is  quite  impossible  for  us  to  say  whether,  in  the 
historical  development  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy 
at  the  time  of  Badarayana  and  afterwards,  it  was 
the  absolute  Monism  as  represented  by  /S'a??ikara 


RAMANUGA.  249 

that  took  the  lead,  or  whether  the  more  temperate 
Monism,  as  we  see  it  in  Ramanur/a's  commentary, 
exercised  an  earlier  sway.  There  are  certainly  some 
Sutras  which,  as  Dr.  Thibaut  has  shown,  lend  them- 
selves far  more  readily  to  Ramanur/a's  than  to  Ssun- 
kara's  interpretation.  The  question  as  to  the  nature 
of  individual  souls  seems  decided  by  the  author  of 
the  Sutras  in  favour  of  Ramanw/a  rather  than  of 
$amkara.  We  read  in  Sutra  II,  3,  43,  '  The  soul 
is  a  part  of  Brahman.'  Here  the  soul  is  clearly 
declared  to  be  a  part  of  Brahman,  and  this  is  the 
view  of  Ramanur/a  ;  but  /Samkara  explains  it  by  '  a 
part,  as  it  were,'  since  Brahman,  being  not  composed 
of  parts,  cannot  have  parts  in  the  literal  sense  of 
the  word. 

This  seems  a  bold  proceeding  of  /Samkara's  ;  and, 
though  he  tries  to  justify  it  by  very  ingenious 
arguments,  Ramanu^a  naturally  takes  his  stand  on 
the  very  words  of  the  Sutra.  Similar  cases  have 
been  pointed  out  by  Dr.  Thibaut ;  and  this  very 
diversity  of  opinion  confirms  what  I  remarked  before, 
that  the  Vedanta  philosophers  of  India,  though  they 
look  both  on  Upanishads  and  the  Sutras  as  their 
highest  authorities,  often  present  a  body  of  doctrine 
independent  of  them  ;  colonies,  as  it  were,  of  thought 
that  had  grown  to  be  independent  of  the  mother- 
country,  but  are  anxious  nevertheless  to  prove  that 
their  own  doctrines  can  be  reconciled  with  the  old 
authorities.  This  was  the  position  assumed  by 
Badarayana  towards  the  Upanishads,  so  much  so 
that  nearly  the  whole  of  the  first  book  of  his  Sutras 
had  to  be  devoted  to  showing  that  his  own  views 
of  Brahman  were  not  in  conflict  with  certain  pas- 
sages in  the  Upanishads.  Some  of  them  may  refer 


250  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

to  the  lower  Brahman,  some  to  the  individual  soul 
as  one  with  Brahman ;  and  it  is  on  these  points  that, 
at  a  later  time,  $amkara  and  Ramanuf/a  would 
naturally  have  differed.  What  was  important  for 
Bcidarayawa  to  show  was  that  no  passages  from  the 
Upanishads  could  fairly  be  quoted  in  support  of 
other  philosophies,  such  as  the  Sa??ikhya,  of  which 
both  /Sawkara  and  RamanuT/a  would  disapprove. 
In  the  same  manner  both  /Samkara  and  Ramanuc/a 
are  anxious  to  show  that  they  themselves  are  in 
perfect  agreement  with  Badarayana.  Both,  however, 
approach  the  Sutras  as  if  they  had  some  opinions 
of  their  own  to  defend  and  to  bring  into  harmony 
with  the  Sutras.  We  can  only  suppose  that  schools 
in  different  parts  of  India  had  been  growing  up  fast 
in  the  hermitages  of  certain  teachers  and  their 
pupils,  and  that  all  were  anxious  to  show  that  they 
had  not  deviated  from  such  paramount  and  infallible 
authorities  as  the  Sutras  and  the  Upanishads.  This 
was  done  by  means  of  what  is  called  Mimawsa,  or 
a  critical  discussion  of  passages  which  seemed  to  be 
ambiguous  or  had  actually  been  twisted  into  an 
unnatural  meaning  by  important  teachers. 

Dr.  Thibaut  therefore  seems  to  me  quite  right 
when  he  says  that  both  $amkara  and  Ramanm/a 
pay  often  less  regard  to  the  literal  sense  of  the 
words  and  to  tradition  than  to  their  desire  of  forcing 
Badarayana  to  bear  testimony  to  the  truth  of  their 
own  philosophical  theories.  This  only  confirms  what 
I  said  before  about  the  rich  growth  of  philosophical 
thought  in  India,  independent  of  Sutras  and  Upani- 
shads, though  influenced  by  both.  Even  if  we 

1  S.B.E.,  XXXIV,  p.  xcvi. 


RAMANUtfA.  251 

admit  that  Badarayam  wished  to  teach  in  his  Sutras 
nothing  but  what  he  found  in  the  Upariishads,  it 
must  not  be  forgotten  that  the  Upanishads  contain 
ever  so  many  conflicting  guesses  at  truth,  freely 
uttered  by  thinkers  who  had  no  personal  relations 
with  each  other,  and  had  no  idea  of  propounding 
a  uniform  system  of  religious  philosophy.  If  these 
conflicting  utterances  of  the  Upanishads  had  to  be 
reduced  to  a  system,  we  can  hardly  blame  $amkara 
for  his  taking  refuge  in  the  theory  of  a  higher  and 
a  lower  Brahman,  the  former  being  the  Brahman  of 
philosophy,  the  other  that  of  religion,  and  both,  as 
he  thought,  to  be  found  in  different  parts  of  the  Veda. 
By  doing  that  he  avoided  the  necessity  of  arguing 
away  a  number  of  purely  anthropomorphic  features, 
incongruous,  if  applied  to  the  highest  Brahman,  and 
dragging  down  even  the  Brahman  of  the  lower  Vidya 
to  a  lower  stage  than  philosophers  would  approve 
of.  Ramanugra's  Brahman  is  always  one  and  the 
same,  and,  according  to  him,  the  knowledge  of 
Brahman  is  likewise  but  one  ;  but  his  Brahman  is 
in  consequence  hardly  more  than  an  exalted  Isvara. 
He  is  able  to  perform  the  work  of  creation  without 
any  help  from  Maya  or  Avidya ;  and  the  souls  of 
the  departed,  if  only  their  life  has  been  pure  and 
holy,  are  able  to  approach  this  Brahma,  sitting  on 
his  throne,  and  to  enjoy  their  rewards  in  a  heavenly 
paradise.  The  higher  conception  of  Brahman  ex- 
cluded of  course  not  only  everything  mythological, 
but  everything  like  activity  or  workmanship,  so  that 
creation  could  only  be  conceived  as  caused  by  Maya  l 

1  Ved.  Sutras  II,  2,  2,  sub  fine:  Avidyapratyupasthapita- 
namarupamayavesavasena,  '  Through  being  possessed  of  the 
Maya  of  names  and  forms  brought  near  by  Avidya.' 


252  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

or  Avidya  ;  while  the  very  idea  of  an  approach  of 
the  souls  of  the  departed  to  the  throne  of  Brahman, 
or  of  their  souls  being  merged  in  Brahman,  was 
incompatible  with  the  fundamental  tenet  that  the 
two  were,  and  always  remain,  one  and  the  same, 
never  separated  except  by  Nescience.  The  idea  of 
an  approach  of  the  soul  to  Brahman,  nay,  even  of 
the  individual  soul  being  a  separate  part  of  Brahman, 
to  be  again  joined  to  Brahman  after  death,  runs 
counter  to  the  conception  of  Brahman,  as  explained 
by  $a?'/ikara,  however  prominent  it  may  be  in  the 
Upanishads  and  in  the  system  of  Ilamanur/a.  It 
must  be  admitted  therefore  that  in  India,  instead  of 
one  Vedanta-philosophy,  we  have  really  two,  spring- 
ing from  the  same  root  but  extending  its  branches 
in  two  very  different  directions,  that  of  $awkara 
being  kept  for  unflinching  reasoners  who,  supported 
by  an  unwavering  faith  in  Monism,  do  not  shrink 
from  any  of  its  consequences ;  another,  that  of 
RamanuT/a,  trying  hard  to  reconcile  their  Monism 
with  the  demands  of  the  human  heart  that  re- 
quired, and  always  will  require,  a  personal  god,  as 
the  last  cause  of  all  that  is,  and  an  eternal  soul 
that  yearns  for  an  approach  to  or  a  reunion  with 
that  Being. 

I  am  well  aware  that  the  view  of  the  world,  of 
God,  and  of  the  soul,  as  propounded  by  the  Vedantists, 
whether  in  the  Upanishads  or  in  the  Sutras  and 
their  commentaries,  has  often  been  declared  strange 
and  fanciful,  and  unworthy  of  the  name  of  philosophy, 
at  all  events  utterly  unsuited  to  the  West,  whatever 
may  have  been  its  value  in  the  East.  I  have  nothing 
to  say  against  this  criticism,  nor  have  I  ever  tried 
to  make  propaganda  for  Vedantism,  least  of  all  in 


RAMANUffA.  253 

England.  But  I  maintain  that  it  represents  a  phase 
of  philosophic  thought  which  no  student  of  philo- 
sophy can  afford  to  ignore,  and  which  in  no  country 
can  be  studied  to  greater  advantage  than  in  India. 
And  I  go  even  a  step  further.  I  quite  admit  that, 
as  a  popular  philosophy,  the  Vedanta  would  have  its 
dangers,  that  it  would  fail  to  call  out  and  strengthen 
the  manly  qualities  required  for  the  practical  side  of 
life,  and  that  it  might  raise  the  human  mind  to  a 
height  from  which  the  most  essential  virtues  of  social 
and  political  life  might  dwindle  away  into  mere 
phantoms.  At  the  same  time  I  make  no  secret  that 
all  my  life  I  have  been  very  fond  of  the  Vedanta. 
Nay,  I  can  fully  agree  with  Schopenhauer,  and  quite 
understand  what  he  meant  when  he  said, — '  In  the 
whole  world  there  is  no  study,  except  that  of  the 
original  (of  the  Upanishads),  so  beneficial  and  so 
elevating  as  that  of  the  Oupnekhat  (Persian  trans- 
lation of  the  Upanishads).  It  has  been  the  solace 
of  my  life,  it  will  be  the  solace  of  my  death.' 

Schopenhauer  was  the  last  man  to  write  at  random, 
or  to  allow  himself  to  go  into  ecstasies  over  so-called 
mystic  and  inarticulate  thought.  And  I  am  neither 
afraid  nor  ashamed  to  say  that  I  share  his  enthusiasm 
for  the  Vedanta,  and  feel  indebted  to  it  for  much 
that  has  been  helpful  to  me  in  my  passage  through 
life.  After  all  it  is  not  everybody  who  is  called 
upon  to  take  an  active  part  in  life,  whether  in  de- 
fending or  ruling  a  country,  in  amassing  wealth,  or 
in  breaking  stones ;  and  for  fitting  men  to  lead 
contemplative  and  quiet  lives,  I  know7  no  better 
preparation  than  the  Vedanta.  A  man  may  be  a 
Platonist,  and  yet  a  good  citizen  and  an  honest 
Christian,  and  I  should  say  the  same  of  a  Vedantist. 


254  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

They  may  be  called  useless  by  the  busy  and  toiling 
portion  of  humanity;  but  if  it  is  true  that  'those 
also  serve  who  only  stand  and  wait,'  then  may  we 
not  hope  that  even  the  quiet  in  the  land  are  not  so 
entirely  useless  as  they  appear  to  be  ? 

And  while  some  of  the  most  important  doctrines 
of  the  Vedanta,  when  placed  before  us  in  the  plain 
and  direct  language  of  the  Vedanta-Sutras,  may  often 
seem  very  startling  to  us,  it  is  curious  to  observe 
how,  if  clothed  in  softer  language,  they  do  not  jar  at 
all  on  our  ears,  nay,  are  in  full  harmony  with  our 
own  most  intimate  convictions.  Thus,  while  the 
idea  that  our  own  self  and  the  Divine  Self  are 
identical  in  nature  might  seem  irreverent,  if  not 
blasphemous,  one  of  our  own  favourite  hymns 
contains  the  prayer,— 

And  that  a  higher  gift  than  grace 

Should  flesh  and  blood  refine, 
God's  Presence  and  His  very  Self, 

And  Essence  all-divine  ! 

This  is  pure  Vedanta.  We  also  speak  without 
hesitation  of  our  body  as  the  temple  of  God,  and  of 
the  voice  of  God  within  us  ;  nay,  we  repeat  with 
St.  Paul  that  we  live,  and  move,  and  have  our 
being  in  God,  yet  we  shrink  from  adopting  the  plain 
and  simple  language  of  the  Upanishads  that  the  Self 
of  God  and  man  is  the  same. 

Again,  the  unreality  of  the  material  world,  though 
proved  point  by  point  by  Berkeley,  seems  to  many  a 
pure  fancy  ;  and  yet  one  of  our  most  popular  poets, 
the  very  type  of  manliness  and  strength,  both  mental 
and  physical,  speaks  like  a  Vedantist  of  the  shadows 
among  which  we  move  :— 


METAPHORS.  255 

For  more  than  once  when  I ' 
Sat  all  alone,  revolving  in  myself 
The  word  that  is  the  symbol  of  myself, 
The  mortal  limit  of  the  Self  was  loosed, 
And  passed  into  the  Nameless,  as  a  cloud 
Melts  into  Heaven.     I  touched  my  limbs — the  limbs 
Were  strange,  not  mine — and  yet  no  shade  of  doubt, 
But  utter  clearness,  and  thro'  loss  of  Self 
The  gain  of  such  large  life  as  matched  with  ours 
Were  Sun  to  spark — unshadowable  in  words, 
Themselves  but  shadows  of  a  shadow-world. 

It  would  be  easy  to  add  similar  passages  from 
Wordsworth,  Goethe,  and  others,  to  show  that  after 
all  there  is  some  of  the  Indian  leaven  left  in  us, 
however  unwilling  we  may  be  to  confess  it.  Indian 
thought  will  never  quite  square  with  English 
thoughts,  and  the  English  words  which  we  have  to 
adopt  in  rendering  Indian  ideas  are  never  quite 
adequate.  All  we  can  do  is  to  strive  to  approximate 
as  near  as  possible,  and  not  to  allow  these  inevitable 
differences  to  prejudice  us  against  what,  though 
differently  expressed,  is  often  meant  for  the  same. 

There  is  one  more  point  that  requires  a  few 
remarks. 

Metaphors. 

It  has  often  been  said  that  the  Yedanta-philosophy 
deals  too  much  in  metaphors,  and  that  most  of  them, 
though  fascinating  at  first  sight,  leave  us  in  the  end 
unsatisfied,  because  they  can  only  illustrate,  but 
cannot  prove.  This  is  true,  no  doubt  ;  but  in  philo- 
sophy illustration  also  by  means  of  metaphors  has 
its  value,  and  I  doubt  whether  they  were  ever  meant 
for  more  than  that.  Thus,  when  the  Vedarita  has  to 


Tennyson,  The  Ancient  Sage. 


256  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

explain  how  the  Sat,  the  Real  or  Brahman,  dwells 
within  us,  though  we  cannot  distinguish  it,  the  author 
of  the  jfTMndogya  Up.  VI,  13,  introduces  a  father 
telling  his  son  to  throw  a  lump  of  salt  into  water,  and 
after  some  time  to  take  it  out  again.  Of  course  he 
cannot  do  it,  but  whenever  he  tastes  the  water  it  is 
salt.  In  the  same  way,  the  father  says,  the  Sat,  the 
Divine,  is  within  us,  though  we  cannot  perceive  it 
by  itself. 

Another  application  of  the  same  simile  (Brihad. 
Ar.  Up.  II,  4,  12)  seems  intended  to  show  that  the 
Sat  or  Brahman,  in  permeating  the  whole  elementary 
world,  vanishes,  so  that  there  is  no  distinction  left 
between  the  individual  Self  and  the  Highest  Self1. 

Again,  when  we  read2  that  the  manifold  beings 
are  produced  from  the  Eternal  as  sparks  spring 
from  a  burning  fire,  we  should  remember  that  this 
metaphor  illustrates  the  idea  that  all  created  beings 
share  in  the  substance  of  the  Supreme  Being,  that 
for  a  time  they  seem  to  be  independent,  but  that 
they  vanish  again  without  causing  any  diminution 
in  the  Power  from  whence  they  sprang. 

The  idea  of  a  creating  as  a  making  of  the  world 
is  most  repugnant  to  the  Vedantist,  and  he  tries  in 
every  way  to  find  another  simile  by  which  to  illus- 
trate the  springing  of  the  world  from  Brahman  as 
seen  in  this  world  of  Nescience.  In  order  to  avoid 
the  necessity  of  admitting  something  extraneous, 
some  kind  of  matter  out  of  which  the  world  was 
shaped,  the  Upanishads  point  to  the  spider  spinning 
its  web  out  of  itself;  and,  in  order  to  show  that 
things  can  spring  into  existence  spontaneously,  they 

1  See  Deussen,  Upanishads,  p.  416,  fora  different  explanation. 

2  Bnh.  Ar.  Up.  II,  i,  20. 


METAPHORS.  257 

use  the  simile  of  the  hairs  springing  from  a  man's 
head  without  any  special  wish  of  the  man  himself. 

Now  it  may  be  quite  true  that  none  of  these 
illustrations  can  be  considered,  nor  were  they  in- 
tended as  arguments  in  support  of  the  Upanishad- 
philosophy,  but  they  are  at  all  events  very  useful  in 
reminding  us  by  means  of  striking  similes  of  certain 
doctrines  arrived  at  by  the  Vedanta  philosophers 
in  their  search  after  truth. 


CHAPTER  V. 


IT  would  be  interesting  to  trace  at  once  the  same 
or  very  similar  tendencies  as  those  of  the  Vedanta  in 
the  development  of  other  Indian  philosophies,  and 
particularly  of  the  Sarakhya  and  Yoga,  and  to  see 
what  they  have  to  say  on  the  existence  and  the 
true  nature  of  a  Supreme  Being,  and  the  relation 
of  human  beings  to  that  Divine  Being,  as  shadowed 
forth  in  certain  passages  of  the  Veda,  though 
differently  interpreted  by  different  schools  of  philo- 
sophy. But  it  seems  better  on  the  whole  to  adhere 
to  the  order  adopted  by  the  students  of  philosophy 
in  India,  and  treat  of  the  other  Mima?«sa,  the  Purva- 
Mima?HS'i,  that  is  the  Former  Mimamsa,  as  it  is 
called,  in  connection  with  the  one  we  have  examined. 
The  Hindus  admit  a  Purva-Mima?rtsa  and  an  Uttara- 
Mimawsa.  They  look  upon  the  Vedanta  as  the 
Uttara-  or  later  Mima?^sa,  and  on  that  of  G'aimini 
as  the  Purva-,  or  prior.  These  names,  however,  were 
not  meant  to  imply,  as  Colebrooke  l  seems  to  have 
supposed,  that  the  Purva-Mimfvwsa  was  prior  in 
time,  though  it  is  true  that  it  is  sometimes  called 
Pra/,'i  -,  previous.  It  really  meant  no  more  than  that 


1  Colebrooke,   Misc.   Essays,  vol.  i,   p.  239.      Kilter,   History 
of  Philosophy,  vol.  iv,  p.  376,  in  Morrison's  translation. 

2  Sarvadarsana-sawgraha,  p.  122,  1.  3. 


PURVA-MfMAA/SA.  259 

the  Purva-Mimamsa,  having  to  do  with  the  Karma- 
kancZa,  the  first  or  work-part  of  the  Veda,  comes 
first,  and  the  Uttara-Mimarasa,  being  concerned  with 
the  Grfl&nak&nda,,  comes  second,  just  as  an  orthodox 
Hindu  at  one  time  was  required  to  be  a  Grihastha  or 
householder  first,  and  then  only  to  retire  into  the 
forest  and  lead  the  contemplative  life  of  a  Vana- 
prastha  or  a  Samnyasin.  We  shall  see,  however, 
that  this  prior  Mima??isa,  if  it  can  be  called  a  philo- 
sophy at  all,  is  very  inferior  in  interest  to  the 
Vedanta,  and  could  hardly  be  understood  without 
the  previous  existence  of  such  a  system  as  that  of 
Badarayana.  I  should  not  like,  however,  to  commit 
myself  so  far  as  to  claim  priority  in  time  for  the 
Vedanta.  It  has  a  decided  priority  in  importance, 
and  in  its  relation  to  the  (r/lana- portion  of  the 
Veda.  We  saw  why  the  fact  that  Badaraya^a 
quotes  6raimini  cannot  be  used  for  chronological 
purposes,  for  (7aimini  returns  the  compliment  and 
quotes  Badarayana.  How  this  is  to  be  accounted 
for,  I  tried  to  explain  before.  It  is  clear  that  while 
Badarayana  endeavoured  to  introduce  order  into 
the  Upanishads,  and  to  reduce  their  various  guesses 
to  something  like  a  system,  6raimini  undertook  to 
do  the  same  for  the  rest  of  the  Veda,  the  so-called 
Karmakaijc/a  or  work-portion,  that  is,  all  that  had 
regard  to  sacrifice,  as  described  chiefly  in  the  Brah- 
manas.  Sacrifice  was  so  much  the  daily  life  of  the 
Brahmans  that  the  recognised  name  for  sacrifice 
was  simply  Karman,  i.e.  work.  That  work  grew 
up  in  different  parts  of  India,  just  as  we  saw  philo- 
sophy springing  up,  full  of  variety,  not  free  even 
from  contradictions.  Every  day  had  its  sacrifice, 
and  in  some  respects  these  regular  sacrifices  may  be 

s  2 


260  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

called  the  first  calendar  of  India.  They  depended 
on  the  seasons  or  regulated  the  seasons  and  marked 
the  different  divisions  of  the  year.  There  were 
some  rites  that  lasted  the  whole  year  or  even  several 
years.  And  as  philosophy  existed,  independent  of 
the  Upanishads,  and  through  BMarayana  attempted 
to  make  peace  with  the  Upanishads,  we  must  con- 
sider that  sacrifices  also  existed  for  a  long  time 
without  the  Brahmar/.as,  such  as  we  possess  them, 
that  they  grew  up  without  being  restrained  by 
generally  binding  authorities  of  any  kind,  and 
that  at  a  later  time  only,  after  the  Brahmanas  had 
been  composed  and  had  acquired  some  kind  of 
authority,  the  necessity  began  to  be  felt  of  recon- 
ciling variant  opinions  and  customs,  as  embodied 
in  the  Brahmanas  and  elsewhere,  giving  general  as 
well  as  special  rules  for  the  performance  of  every 
kind  of  ceremony.  We  can  hardly  imagine  that  there 
ever  was  a  time  in  India  when  the  so-called  priests, 
settled  in  distant  localities,  did  not  know  how  to 
perform  their  own  sacrificial  duties,  for  who  were 
the  authors  of  them,  if  not  the  priests?  But  when 
the  Brahmanas  once  existed,  a  new  problem  had  to 
be  solved  :  how  to  bring  the  Brahmanas  into  har- 
mony with  themselves  and  with  existing  family  and 
local  customs,  and  also  how  to  discover  in  them  a 
meaning  that  should  satisfy  every  new  generation. 
This  was  achieved  by  means  of  what  is  called 
Mlm^msa,  investigation,  examination,  consideration. 
There  is  little  room  for  real  philosophy  in  all  this,  but 
there  are  questions  such  as  that  of  Dharma  or  duty, 
including  sacrificial  duties,  which  offer  an  opportunity 
for  discussing  the  origin  of  duty  and  the  nature  of  its 
rewards  ;  while  in  accounting  for  seeming  contradic- 


PURVA-MfMAMSA.  261 

tions,  in  arriving  at  general  principles  concerning 
sacrificial  acts,  problems  would  naturally  turn  up 
which,  though  often  in  themselves  valueless,  are 
generally  treated  with  considerable  ingenuity.  In 
this  way  the  work  of  6raimini  secured  for  itself 
a  place  by  the  side  of  the  works  ascribed  to 
Badarayafta,  Kapila  and  others,  and  was  actually 
raised  to  the  rank  of  one  of  the  six  classical  philo- 
sophies of  India.  It  cannot  therefore  be  passed  over 
in  a  survey  of  Indian  philosophy. 

While  Badaraya^a  begins  his  Sutras  with  Athato 
Brahmagdc/nasa,  '  Now  therefore  the  desire  of  know- 
ing Brahman,'  6raimini,  apparently  in  imitation  of 
it,  begins  with  Athato  Dharmaf/ig^asa,  '  Now  there- 
fore the  desire  of  knowing  Dharma  or  duty.'  The 
two  words  '  Now  therefore '  offer  as  usual  a  large 
scope  to  a  number  of  interpreters,  but  they  mean 
no  more  in  the  end  than  that  now,  after  the  Veda 
has  been  read,  and  because  it  has  been  read,  there 
arises  a  desire  for  knowing  the  full  meaning  of 
either  Dharma,  duty,  or  of  Brahman,  the  Absolute  ; 
the  former  treated  in  the  Uttara-,  the  latter  in  the 
Purva-Mimamsa.  In  fact,  whatever  native  commen- 
tators may  say  to  the  contrary,  this  first  Sutra  is 
not  much  more  than  a  title,  as  if  we  were  to  say, 
Now  begins  the  philosophy  of  duty,  or  the  philo- 
sophy of  (raimini. 

Dharma,  here  translated  by  duty,  refers  to  acts 
of  prescriptive  observance,  chiefly  sacrifices.  It  is 
said  to  be  a  neuter,  if  used  in  the  latter  sense, 
a  very  natural  distinction,  though  there  is  little 
evidence  to  that  eifect  in  the  Sutras  or  in  the  litera- 
ture known  to  us. 

This  Dharma  or  duty  is  enjoined  in  the  Brah- 


262  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 


and  these  together  with  the  Mantras  are 
held  to  constitute  the  whole  of  the  Veda,  so  that 
whatever  is  not  Mantra  is  Brahmana,  whatever  is 
not  Brahma/ia  is  Mantra.  The  Brahmarias  are  said 
to  consist  of  Vidhis,  injunctions,  and  Arthavadas, 
glosses.  The  injunctions  are  meant  either  to  make 
us  do  a  thing  that  had  not  been  done  before,  or  to 
make  us  know  a  thing  that  had  not  been  known 
before  l.  Subsequently  the  Vidhis  2  are  divided 
into  Utpatti-vidhis,  original  or  general  injunctions, 
such  as  Agnihotram  guhoti,  he  performs  the  Agni- 
hotra,  and  Viniyoga-vidhi,  showing  the  manner  in 
which  a  sacrifice  is  to  be  performed.  The  latter 
comprises  injunctions  as  to  the  details,  such  as 
Dadhn&  (/uhoti,  he  performs  the  sacrifice  with  sour 
milk,  &c.  Then  follow  the  Prayoga-vidhis  which 
settle  the  exact  order  of  sacrificial  performances, 
and  there  is  lastly  a  class  of  injunctions  which 
determine  who  is  fit  to  perform  a  sacrificial  act. 
They  are  called  Adhikara-vidhis. 

The  hymns  or  formulas  which  are  to  be  used  at 
a  sacrifice,  though  they  are  held  to  possess  also  a 
transcendental  or  mysterious  effect,  the  Apurva,  are 
by  6raimini  conceived  as  mainly  intended  to  remind 
the  sacrificer  of  the  gods  who  are  to  receive  his 
sacrificial  gifts. 

He  likewise  lays  stress  on  what  he  calls  Na- 
madheya  or  the  technical  name  of  each  sacrifice, 
such  as  Agnihotra,  Darsapurttamasa,  Udbhid,  &c. 
These  names  are  found  in  the  Brahmawas  and  they 
are  considered  important,  as  no  doubt  they  are,  in 
defining  the  nature  of  a  sacrifice.  The  Nishedhas 

1  Rigvedabhashya,  vol.  i,  p.  5. 

2  Thibaut,  Arthasawigraha,  p.  viii. 


CONTENTS    OF    THE    PT>RVA-MIMAMSA.  263 

or  prohibitions  require  no  explanation.    They  simply 
state  what  ought  not  to  be  done  at  a  sacrifice. 

Lastly,  the  Arthavadas  are  passages  in  the  Brah- 
manas  which  explain  certain  things ;  they  vary  in 
character,  being  either  glosses,  comments,  or  ex- 
planatory statements. 

Contents  of  the  Purva-Mlmaws§.. 

Perhaps  I  cannot  do  better  than  give  the  prin- 
cipal contents  of  (raimini's  Sutras,  as  detailed  by 
Madhava  in  his  Nyaya-mala-vistara  \  The  Mi- 
ma/wsa  consists  of  twelve  books.  In  the  first  book 
is  discussed  the  authoritativeness  of  those  collec- 
tions of  words  which  are  severally  meant  by  the 
terms  injunction  (Vidhi),  explanatory  passage  (Artha- 
vada),  hymn  (Mantra),  tradition  (Snm'ti),  and  name 
(Namadheya).  In  the  second  we  find  certain  sub- 
sidiary discussions,  as  e.  g.  on  Apurva,  relative  to 
the  difference  of  various  rites,  refutation  of  erro- 
neously alleged  proofs,  and  difference  of  perform- 
ance, as  in  obligatory  and  voluntary  offerings.  In 
the  third  are  considered  revelation  ($ruti),  '  sign '  or 
sense  of  a  passage  (Linga),  '  context '  ( Vakya),  &c., 
and  their  respective  weight,  when  in  apparent 
opposition  to  one  another ;  then  the  cerarnonies 
called  Pratipathi-Karmam,  things  mentioned  by  the 
way,  Anarabhyadhita,  things  accessory  to  several 
main  objects,  as  Praya^as,  &c.,  and  the  duties  of 
the  sacrificer.  In  the  fourth  the  chief  subject  is 
the  influence  of  the  principal  and  subordinate  rites 
on  other  rites,  the  fruit  produced  by  the  (ruhA 

1  See  Cowell  and  Gough  in  their  translation  of  the  Sarvadar- 
sana-samgraha,  p.  178. 


264  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

when  made  of  the  Butea  frondosa,  &c.,  and  the 
dice-playing,  &c.,  which  forms  part  of  the  Ka^/asuya- 
sacrifice.  In  the  fifth  the  subjects  are  the  relative 
order  of  different  passages  of  the  /Sruti,  &c.,  the  order 
of  different  parts  of  a  sacrifice,  as  the  seventeen 
animals  at  the  Va(/apeya,  the  multiplication  and 
non-multiplication  of  rites,  and  the  respective  force 
of  the  words  of  the  /Sruti,  the  order  of  mention,  &c.,  as 
determining  the  order  of  performance.  In  the  sixth 
we  read  of  the  persons  qualified  to  offer  sacrifices, 
then:  obligations,  the  substitutes  for  prescribed  mate- 
rials, supplies  for  lost  or  injured  offerings,  expiatory 
rites,  the  Sattra-offerings,  things  proper  to  be  given, 
and  the  different  sacrificial  fines.  In  the  seventh 
is  treated  the  mode  of  transference  of  the  cere- 
monies of  one  sacrifice  to  another  by  direct  command 
in  the  Vaidic  text,  others  as  inferred  by  '  name '  or 
'  sign.'  In  the  eighth,  transference  by  virtue  of  the 
clearly  expressed  or  obscurely  expressed  '  sign '  or 
by  the  predominant  '  sign,'  and  cases  also  where  no 
transference  takes  place.  In  the  ninth,  the  dis- 
cussion begins  with  the  adaptation  (Uha)  of  hymns, 
when  quoted  in  a  new  connection,  the  adaptation 
of  Samans  and  Mantras,  and  collateral  questions 
connected  therewith.  In  the  tenth  the  occasions 
are  discussed  where  the  non-performance  of  the 
primary  rite  involves  the  '  preclusion '  and  non- 
performance  of  the  dependent  rites,  and  occasions 
when  rites  are  precluded,  because  other  rites  pro- 
duce their  special  results,  also  Graha-offerings, 
certain  Samans,  and  various  other  things,  as  well 
as  different  kinds  of  negation.  In  the  eleventh  we 
find  the  incidental  mention  and  subsequently  the 
fuller  discussion  of  Tantra,  where  several  acts  are 


PRAMA^AS    OF    GAIMINI.  265 

combined  into  one,  and  Avapa,  or  the  performing 
an  act  more  than  once.  In  the  twelfth  there  is 
the  discussion  on  Prasaiiga,  when  the  rite  is  per- 
formed with  one  chief  purpose,  but  with  an  incidental 
further  reference,  on  Tantra,  cumulation  of  concur- 
rent rites  (Samu&Maya),  and  option. 

It  is  easy  to  see  from  this  table  of  contents  that 
neither  Plato  nor  Kant  would  have  felt  much  the 
wiser  for  them.  But  we  must  take  philosophies  as 
they  are  given  us ;  and  we  should  spoil  the  picture 
of  the  philosophical  life  of  India,  if  we  left  out  of 
consideration  their  speculations  about  sacrifice  as  con- 
tained in  the  Purva-Mima/msa.  There  are  passages, 
however,  which  appeal  to  philosophers,  such  as, 
for  instance,  the  chapter  on  the  Pramanas  or  the 
authoritative  sources  of  knowledge,  on  the  relation 
between  word  and  thought,  and  similar  subjects. 
It  is  true  that  most  of  these  questions  are  treated 
in  the  other  philosophies  also,  but  they  have  a 
peculiar  interest  as  treated  by  the  ritualistic  Purva- 
Mimamsa. 

Pramawas  of  Craimini. 

Thus  if  we  turn  our  attention  first  to  the  Pra- 
manas,  the  measures  of  knowledge,  or  the  authorities 
to  which  we  can  appeal  as  the  legitimate  means 
of  knowledge,  as  explained  by  the  Purva-Mlma??isa, 
we  saw  before  that  the  Vedantists  did  riot  pay 
much  attention  to  them,  though  they  were  ac- 
quainted with  the  three  fundamental  Pramawas 
—sense-perception,  inference,  and  revelation.  The 
Purva-Mimamsa,  on  the  contrary,  devoted  consider- 
able attention  to  this  subject,  and  admitted  five, 
(i)  Sense-perception,  Pratyaksha,  when  the  organs 


266  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

are  actually  in  contiguity  with  an  object  ;  (2)  In- 
ference (Anumana),  i.  e.  the  apprehension  of  an 
unseen  member  of  a  known  association  (Vyapti) 
by  the  perception  of  another  seen  member ;  (3) 
Comparison  (Upamana),  knowledge  arising  from 
resemblance ;  (4)  Presumption  (Arthapatti),  such 
knowledge  as  can  be  derived  of  a  thing  not  itself 
perceived,  but  implied  by  another  ;  (5)  >S'abda,  verbal 
information  derived  from  authoritative  sources.  One 
sect  of  Mima?nsakas,  those  who  follow  Kumarila 
Bha^a,  admitted  besides,  (6)  Abhava,  not-being, 
which  seems  but  a  subdivision  of  inference,  as  if  we 
infer  dryness  of  the  soil  from  the  not-being  or 
absence  of  clouds  and  rain. 

All  these  sources  of  information  are  carefully 
examined,  but  it  is  curious  that  Mimamsakas  should 
admit  this  large  array  of  sources  of  valid  cog- 
nition, considering  that  for  their  own  purposes, 
for  establishing  the  nature  of  Dharma  or  duty, 
they  practically  admit  but  one,  namely  scripture 
or  /S'abda.  Duty,  they  hold,  cannot  rest  on  human 
authority,  because  the  '  ought '  which  underlies 
all  duty,  can  only  be  supplied  by  an  authority  that 
is  more  than  human  or  more  than  fallible,  and  such 
an  authority  is  nowhere  to  be  found  except  in  the 
Veda.  This  leaves,  of  course,  the  task  of  proving 
the  superhuman  origin  of  the  Veda  on  the  shoulders 
of  6?aimini  ;  and  we  shall  see  hereafter  how  he  per- 
forms it. 

Stltra-style. 

Before,  however,  we  enter  on  a  consideration  of 
any  of  the  problems  treated  in  the  Purva-Mimamsa, 
a  few  remarks  have  to  be  made  on  a  peculiarity  in 


SUTKA-STYLE.  267 

the  structure  of  the  Sutras.  In  order  to  discuss  a 
subject  fully,  and  to  arrive  in  the  end  at  a  definite 
opinion,  the  authors  of  the  Sutras  are  encouraged 
to  begin  with  stating  first  every  possible  objection 
that  can  reasonably  be  urged  against  what  is  their 
own  opinion.  As  long  as  the  objections  are  not 
perfectly  absurd,  they  have  a  right  to  be  stated, 
and  this  is  called  the  Purvapaksha,  the  first  part. 
Then  follow  answers  to  all  these  objections,  and  this 
is  called  the  Uttarapaksha,  the  latter  part  ;  and 
then  only  are  we  led  on  to  the  final  conclusion,  the 
Siddhanta.  This  system  is  exhaustive  and  has  many 
advantages,  but  it  has  also  the  disadvantage,  as  far 
as  the  reader  is  concerned,  that,  without  a  com- 
mentary, he  often  feels  doubtful  where  the  cons 
end  and  the  pros  begin.  The  commentators  them- 
selves differ  sometimes  on  that  point.  Sometimes 
again,  instead  of  three,  a  case  or  Adhikarana  is 
stated  in  five  members,  namely  :— 

1.  The  subject  to  be  explained  (Vishaya). 

2.  The  doubt  (Samsaya). 

3.  The  first  side  or  prima  facie  view  (Purvapaksha). 

4.  The  demonstrated  conclusion  (Siddhanta) ;  and 

5.  The  connection  (Samgati). 

This  is  illustrated  in  the  commentary  on  the  first 
and  second  Sutras  of  the  Mimamsa  l,  which  declare 
that  a  desire  to  know  duty  is  to  be  entertained,  and 
then  define  duty  (Dharma)  as  that  which  is  to  be 
recognised  by  an  instigatory  passage,  that  is  by  a 
passage  from  the  Veda.  Here  the  question  to  be 
discussed  (Vishaya)  is,  whether  the  study  of  Duty  in 


1  Sarvadarsana-sawgraha,  p.  122;  translation  by  Cowell  and 
Gough,  p.  180;  Siddhanta  Dipika,  1898,  p.  194. 


268  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

(raimini's  Mimams^  is  really  necessary  to  be  under- 
taken. The  Purvapaksha  says  of  course,  No,  for 
when  it  is  said  that  the  Veda  should  be  learnt  (Vedo 
*dhyetavyaA),  that  clearly  means  either  that  it  should 
be  understood,  like  any  other  book  which  we  read,  or 
that  it  should  be  learnt  by  heart  without  any  attempt, 
as  yet,  on  the  part  of  the  pupil  to  understand  it,  simply 
as  a  work  good  in  itself,  which  has  its  reward  in 
heaven.  This  is  a  very  common  view  among  the 
ancient  Brahmans  ;  for,  as  they  had  no  written  books, 
they  had  a  very  perfect  system  for  imprinting  texts 
on  the  memory  of  young  persons,  by  making  them 
learn  every  day  a  certain  number  of  verses  or  lines 
by  heart,  without  any  attempt,  at  first,  of  making 
them  understand  what  they  learnt ;  and  afterwards 
only  supplying  the  key  to  the  meaning.  This  acqui- 
sition of  the  mere  sound  of  the  Veda  was  considered 
highly  meritorious  ;  nay,  some  held  that  the  Veda 
was  more  efficacious,  if  not  understood  than  if 
understood.  This  was  in  fact  their  printing  or 
rather  their  writing,  and  without  it  their  mnemonic 
literature  would  have  been  simply  impossible.  As 
we  warn  our  compositors  against  trying  to  under- 
stand what  they  are  printing,  Indian  pupils  were  cau- 
tioned against  the  same  danger  ;  and  they  succeeded 
in  learning  the  longest  texts  by  heart,  without  even 
attempting  at  first  to  fathom  their  meaning.  To  us 
such  a  system  seems  almost  incredible,  but  no  other 
system  was  possible  in  ancient  times,  and  there  is 
no  excuse  for  being  incredulous,  for  it  may  still  be 
witnessed  in  India  to  the  present  day. 

Only  after  the  text  had  thus  been  imprinted  on 
the  memory,  there  came  the  necessity  of  inter- 
pretation or  understanding.  And  here  the  more 


SUTRA-STYLE.  269 

enlightened  of  the  Indian  theologians  argue  that 
the  Vedic  command  '  Vedo-dhyetavyaA/  '  the  Veda 
is  to  be  gone  over,  that  is,  is  to  be  acquired,  to  be 
learnt  by  heart,'  implies  that  it  is  also  to  be  under- 
stood, and  that  this  intelligible  purpose  is  preferable 
to  the  purely  mechanical  one,  though  miraculous 
rewards  may  be  held  out  for  that. 

But  if  so,  it  is  asked,  what  can  be  the  use  of  the 
Mima?nsEi?  The  pupil  learns  the  Veda  by  heart, 
and  learns  to  understand  it  in  the  house  of  his 
teacher.  After  that  he  bathes,  marries  and  sets  up 
his  own  house,  so  that  it  is  argued  there  would 
actually  be  no  time  for  any  intervening  study  of  the 
MimamsEi.  Therefore  the  imaginary  opponent,  the 
Purvapakshin,  objects  that  the  study  of  the  Mimamsa 
is  not  necessary  at  all,  considering  that  it  rests  on  no 
definite  sacred  command.  But  here  the  Siddhantin 
steps  forward  and  says  that  the  Snm'ti  passage 
enjoining  a  pupil's  bathing  (graduating)  on  returning 
to  his  house  is  not  violated  by  an  intervening  study 
of  the  Mima??isa,  because  it  is  not  said  that,  after 
having  finished  his  apprenticeship,  he  should  imme- 
diately bathe  ;  and  because,  though  his  learning  of 
the  text  of  the  Veda  is  useful  in  every  respect, 
a  more  minute  study  of  the  sacrificial  precepts  of 
the  Veda,  such  as  is  given  in  the  Mima??isa,  cannot 
be  considered  superfluous,  as  a  means  towards  the 
highest  object  of  the  study  of  the  Veda,  viz.  the 
proper  performance  of  its  commands. 

These  considerations  in  support  of  the  Siddhanta 
or  final  conclusion  would  probably  fall  under  the 
name  of  Samgati,  connection,  though  I  must  confess 
that  its  meaning  is  not  quite  clear  to  me.  There 
are  besides  several  points  in  the  course  of  this  dis- 


270  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

cussion,  such  as,  for  instance,  the  so-called  four 
Kriyaphalas,  on  which  more  information  is  much 
to  be  desired. 


Has  the  Veda  a  Superhuman  Origin? 

This  discussion  leads  on  to  another  and  more 
important  one,  whether  the  Veda  has  supreme 
authority,  whether  it  is  the  work  of  man,  or  of  some 
inspired  person,  or  whether  it  is  what  we  should 
call  revealed.  If  it  were  the  work  of  a  person,  then, 
like  any  other  work,  it  could  not  establish  a  duty, 
nor  could  it  promise  any  rewards  as  a  motive  for  the 
performance  of  any  duty  ;  least  of  all,  a  reward  in 
heaven,  such  as  the  Yeda  promises  again  and  again 
to  those  who  perform  Vedic*  sacrifices.  It  follows 
therefore  either  that  the  Veda  has  no  binding 
authority  at  all,  or  that  it  cannot  be  the  work  of 
a  personal  or  human  author.  This  is  a  dilemma 
arising  from  convictions  firmly  planted  in  the  minds 
of  the  ancient  theologians  of  India,  arid  it  is  interest- 
ing to  see  how  they  try  to  escape  from  all  the  diffi- 
culties arising  out  of  their  postulate  that  the  Veda 
must  be  the  work  of  a  superhuman  or  divine  author. 
The  subject  is  interesting  even  though  the  argu- 
ments may  not  be  convincing  to  us.  It  is  clear  that 

*/  O 

even  to  start  such  a  claim  as  being  revealed  for  any 
book  requires  a  considerable  advance  in  religious 
and  philosophical  thought,  and  I  doubt  whether 
such  a  problem  could  have  arisen  in  the  ancient 
literature  of  any  country  besides  India.  The  Jews, 
no  doubt,  had  their  sacred  books,  but  these  books, 
though  sacred,  were  riot  represented  as  having  been 
the  work  of  Jehovah.  They  were  acknowledged  to 


HAS    THE    VEDA    A    SUPERHUMAN    ORIGIN?        27! 

have  been  composed,  if  not  written  down,  by  his- 
torical persons,  even  if,  as  in  the  case  of  Moses,  they 
actually  related  the  death  of  their  reputed  author. 
The  Mimamsa  philosopher  would  probably  have 
argued  that  as  no  writer  could  relate  his  own  death, 
therefore  Deuteronomy  must  be  considered  the  work 
of  a  superhuman  writer  ;  and  some  of  our  modern 
theologians  have  not  been  very  far  from  taking  the 
same  view.  To  the  Brahmans,  any  part  of  the 
Veda,  even  if  it  bore  a  human  or  historical  name, 
was  superhuman,  eternal  and  infallible,  much  as 
the  Gospels  are  in  the  eyes  of  certain  Christian 
theologians,  even  though  they  maintain  at  the  same 
time  that  they  are  historical  documents  written  down 
by  illiterate  people,  or  by  apostles  such  as  St.  Mark 
or  St.  John.  Let  us  see  therefore  how  the  Mimamsa 
deals  with  this  problem  of  the  Apaurusheyatva,  i.  e. 
the  non-human  origin  of  the  Vedas.  Inspiration  in 
the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word  would  not  have 
satisfied  these  Indian  orthodox  philosophers,  for,  as 
they  truly  remark,  this  would  not  exclude  the 
possibility  of  error,  because,  however  true  the  mes- 
sage might  be,  when  given,  the  human  recipient 
would  always  be  a  possible  source  of  error,  as  being 
liable  to  misapprehend  and  misinterpret  such  a 
message.  Even  the  senses,  as  they  point  out, 
can  deceive  us,  so  that  we  mistake  mother-of-pearl 
for  silver  ;  how  much  more  easily  then  may  we 
misapprehend  the  meaning  of  revealed  words  ! 

However,  the  first  thing  is  to  see  how  the  Brah- 
mans, and  particularly  the  Mimamsakas,  tried  to 
maintain  a  superhuman  authorship  in  favour  of  the 
Veda. 

1  quote  from  Madhava's  introduction  to  his  com- 


272  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

mentary  on  the  Rig-veda  l.  He  is  a  great  authority 
in  matters  connected  with  the  Purva-Mimarasa, 
having  written  the  Nyaya-mala-vistara,  a  very  com- 
prehensive treatise  on  the  subject.  In  his  intro- 
duction he  establishes  first  the  authority  of  the 
Mantras  and  of  the  Brahmanas,  both  Vidhis  (rules) 
and  Arthavadas  (glosses),  by  showing  that  they  were 
perfectly  intelligible,  which  had  been  denied.  He 
then  proceeds  to  establish  the  Apaurusheyatva,  the 
non-human  authorship  of  the  Veda,  in  accordance, 
as  he  says,  with  6raimini's  Sutras. 

'Some  people,'  he  says,  and  he  means  of  course 
the  Purvapakshins,  the  recognised  objectors,  '  up- 
hold approximation  towards  the  Vedas,'  that  is  to 
say,  they  hold  that  as  the  Raghuvamsa  of  Kalidasa 
and  other  poems  are  recent,  so  also  are  the  Yedas. 
The  Vedas,  they  continue,  are  not  without  a  begin- 
ning or  eternal,  and  hence  we  find  men  quoted  in 
them  as  the  authors  of  the  Vedas.  As  in  the 
case  of  Vyasa's  Mahabharata  and  Valraiki's  Rama- 
ya?ia,  Vyasa,  Valrniki,  &c.,  are  known  to  be  their 
human  authors,  thus  in  the  case  of  the  Kanaka, 
Kauthuma,  Taittiriya,  and  other  sections  of  the 
Veda,  Ka^Aa,  &c.,  are  given  us  as  the  names  of  the 
authors  of  these  branches  of  the  Veda  ;  and  hence  it 
follows  that  the  Vedas  were  the  works  of  human 
authors. 

And  if  it  were  suggested  that  such  names  as 
Ka^Aa,  &c.,  were  meant  for  men  who  did  no  more 
than  hand  down  the  oral  tradition,  like  teachers, 
the  Purvapakshin  is  ready  witli  a  new  objection, 
namely,  that  the  Vedas  must  be  of  human  origin, 


1  See  my  Second  Edition,  vol.  i,  p.   10. 


HAS    THE    VEDA    A    SUPERHUMAN    ORIGIN?       273 

because  we  see  in  the  Vedas  themselves  the  mention 
of  temporal  matters.  Thus  we  read  of  a  Babara 
Pravaham,  of  a  Kusuruvinda  Auddalaki,  &c.  The 
Vedas,  therefore,  could  not  have  existed  in  times 
anterior  to  these  persons  mentioned  in  them,  and 
hence  cannot  be  prehistoric,  pre-temporal,  or  eternal. 
It  is  seen  from  this  that  what  is  claimed  for  the 
Veda  is  not  only  revelation,  communicated  to  his- 
torical persons,  but  existence  from  all  eternity,  and 
before  the  beginning  of  all  time.  We  can  under- 
stand therefore  why  in  the  next  Sutra,  which  is  the 
Siddhanta  or  final  conclusion,  (raimini  should  appeal 
to  a  former  Sutra  in  which  he  established  that  even 
the  relation  of  words  to  their  meanings  is  eternal. 
This  subject  had  been  discussed  before,  in  answer  to 
the  inevitable  Objector-general,  the  Purvapakshin, 
who  had  maintained  that  the  relation  between  words 
and  their  meanings  was  conventional  (6eo-ei),  estab- 
lished by  men,  and  therefore  liable  to  error  quite  as 
much  as  the  evidence  of  our  senses.  For  as  we  may 
mistake  mother-of-pearl  for  silver,  we  may  surely 
mistake  the  meaning  of  words,  and  hence  the  mean- 
ing of  words  of  the  Veda  also.  6raimini,  therefore,  in 
this  place,  wishes  us  first  of  all  to  keep  in  mind  that 
the  words  of  the  Vedas  themselves  are  superhuman 
or  supernatural,  nay,  that  sound  itself  is  eternal,  and 
thus  fortified  he  next  proceeds  to  answer  the  objec- 
tions derived  from  such  names  as  Kanaka,  or  Babara 
Pravaham.  This  is  done  by  showing  that  Ka^/ia 
did  not  compose,  but  only  handed  down  a  certain 
portion  of  the  Veda,  and  that  Babara  Pravcaham 
was  meant,  not  as  the  name  of  a  man,  but  as  a  name 
of  the  wind,  Babara  imitating  the  sound,  and  Prava- 
hana  meaning  'carrying  along,'  as  it  were  pro-vehens. 

T 


274  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Then  follows  a  new  objection  taken  from  the  fact 
that  impossible  or  even  absurd  things  occur  in  the 
Veda ;  for  instance,  we  read  that  trees  or  serpents 
performed  a  sacrifice,  or  that  an  old  ox  sang  foolish1 
songs  fit  for  the  Madras.  Hence  it  is  argued  once 
more  that  the  Veda  must  have  been  made  by  human 
beings.  But  the  orthodox  (raimini  answers,  No ; 
for  if  it  had  been  made  by  man,  there  could  be  no 
injunction  for  the  performance  of  sacrifices  like  the 
(ryotish  toma,  as  a  means  of  attaining  Svarga  or  para- 
dise, because  no  man  could  possibly  know  either  the 
means,  or  their  effect ;  and  yet  there  is  this  injunction 
in  the  case  of  the  6ryotish£oma,  and  other  sacrifices 
are  not  different  from  it.  Such  injunctions  as  '  Let  a 
man  who  desires  paradise,  sacrifice  with  the  6ryotish- 
foma '  are  not  like  a  speech  of  a  madman  ;  on  the 
contrary,  they  are  most  rational  in  pointing  out  the 
object  (paradise),  in  suggesting  the  means  (Soma,  £c.), 
and  in  mentioning  all  the  necessary  subsidiary  acts 
(Dikshamya,  &c.).  We  see,  therefore,  that  the  com- 
mands of  the  Veda  are  not  unintelligible  or  absurd. 
And  if  we  meet  with  such  passages  as  that  the  trees 
and  serpents  performed  certain  sacrifices,  we  must 
recognise  in  them  Arthavadas  or  glosses,  conveying 
in  our  case  indirect  laudations  of  certain  sacrifices, 
as  if  to  say,  '  if  even  trees  and  serpents  perform 
them,  how  much  more  should  intelligent  beings  do 
the  same  ! ' 

As,  therefore,  no  flaws  that  might  arise  from 
human  workmanship  can  be  detected  in  the  Veda, 
(raitnini  concludes  triumphantly  that  its  superhuman 
origin  and  its  authority  cannot  be  doubted. 


On  Miidruku,  see  Muir,  Sansk.  Texts,  II,  p.  482. 


SUPPOSED    ATHEISM    OF    PURVA-MIMAJUSA.          275 

This  must  suffice  to  give  a  general  idea  of  the 
character  of  the  Purva-Mimamsa.  We  may  wonder 
why  it  should  ever  have  been  raised  to  the  rank  of 
a  philosophical  system  by  the  side  of  the  Uttara- 
Mim&msa  or  the  Vedanta,  but  it  is  its  method 
rather  than  the  matter  to  which  it  is  applied,  that 
seems  to  have  invested  it  with  a  certain  importance. 
This  Mimamsa  method  of  discussing  questions  has 
been  adopted  in  other  branches  of  learning  also,  for 
instance,  by  the  highest  legal  authorities  in  trying 
to  settle  contested  questions  of  law.  We  meet  with 
it  in  other  systems  of  philosophy  also  as  the  recog- 
nised method  of  discussing  various  opinions  before 
arriving  at  a  final  conclusion. 

There  are  some  curious  subjects  discussed  by 
(raimini,  such  as  what  authority  can  be  claimed  for 
tradition,  as  different  from  revelation,  how  far  the 
recognised  customs  of  certain  countries  should  be 
followed  or  rejected,  what  words  are  to  be  con- 
sidered as  correct  or  incorrect ;  or  again,  how  a  good 
or  bad  act,  after  it  has  been  performed  can,  in 
spite  of  the  lapse  of  time,  produce  good  or  bad 
results  for  the  performer.  All  this  is  certainly  of 
interest  to  the  student  of  Indian  literature,  but 
hardly  to  the  student  of  philosophy,  as  such. 

Supposed  Atheism  of  Purva-Mim&wsa. 

One  more  point  seems  to  require  our  attention, 
namely,  the  charge  of  atheism  that  has  been  brought 
against  (raimini's  Mimamsa.  This  sounds  a  very 
strange  charge  after  what  we  have  seen  of  the 
character  of  this  philosophy,  of  its  regard  for  the 
Veda,  and  the  defence  of  its  revealed  character, 
nay,  its  insistence  on  the  conscientious  observance 

T  2 


276  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  all  ceremonial  injunctions.  Still,  it  has  been 
brought  both  in  ancient  and  in  modern  times.  So 
early  a  philosopher  as  Kumarila  Bha^a  tells  us 
that  the  Mima/nsa  had  been  treated  in  the  world 
as  a  Lokayata l,  i.  e.  an  atheistic  system,  but  that 
he  was  anxious  to  re-establish  it  as  orthodox. 
Professor  Banerjea-  tells  us  that  Prabhakara  also, 
the  other  commentator  of  the  Mima/msa,  had  openly 
treated  this  system  as  atheistic,  and  we  shall  meet 
with  a  passage  from  the  Padma-Pura?ia  supporting 
the  same  view.  However,  there  seems  to  be  a  mis- 
understanding here.  Atheistic  has  always  meant 
a  great  many  things,  so  much  so  that  even  the  most 
pantheistic  system  that  could  be  imagined,  the 
Vedanta,  has,  like  that  of  Spinoza,  been  accused  of 
atheism.  The  reason  is  this.  The  author  of  the 
Vedanta-Sutras,Bcidaraya?ia,  after  having  established 
the  omnipresence  of  Brahman  (III,  2,  36-37)  by 
quoting  a  number  of  passages  from  the  Veda,  such 
as  'Brahman  is  all  this'  (Mu^cZ.  Up.  II,  2,  1 1),  'the 
Self  is  all  this '  (A"Mnd.  Up.  VII,  25,  2),  proceeds  to 
show  (III,  2,  38)  that  the  rewards  also  of  all  works 
proceed  directly  or  indirectly  from  Brahman.  There 
were,  however,  two  opinions  on  this  point,  one,  that 
the  works  themselves  produce  their  fruit  without 
any  divine  interference,  and  in  cases  where  the  fruit 
does  not  appear  at  once,  that  there  is  a  super- 
eensuous  principle,  called  Apiirva,  which  is  the 
direct  result  of  a  deed,  and  produces  fruit  at  a  later 
time  ;  the  other,  that  all  actions  are  directly  or 

1  Lokayata  is  explained  by  Childers,  s.v.,  as  controversy  on 
fabulous  or  absurd  points,  but  in  the  Amba/Ma-Suttu,  I.  ,3,  it  is 
mentioned  as  forming  part  ot  the  studies  proper  for  a  Brahman. 

2  Muir,  III,  95. 


SUPPOSED    ATHEISM    OF    PURVA-MIMAMSA.          277 

indirectly  requited  by  the  Lord.  The  latter  opinion, 
which  is  adopted  by  Badarayana,  is  supported  by  a 
quotation  from  Bn'h.  Up.  IV,  4,  24,  '  This  is  indeed 
the  great,  unborn  Self,  the  giver  of  food,  the  giver  of 
wealth.'  (jaimini,  however,  as  we  are  informed  by 
Badaraya^a  in  the  next  Sutra,  accepted  the  former 
opinion.  The  command  that  '  he  who  is  desirous  of 
the  heavenly  world  should  sacrifice,'  implies,  as  he 
holds,  a  reward  of  the  sacrificer  by  means  of  the 
sacrifice  itself,  and  not  by  any  other  agent.  But 
how  a  sacrifice,  when  it  had  been  performed  and 
was  ended,  could  produce  any  reward,  is  difficult 
to  understand.  In  order  to  explain  this,  6raimini 
assumes  that  there  was  a  result,  viz.  an  invisible 
something,  a  kind  of  after-state  of  a  deed  or  an 
invisible  antecedent  state  of  the  result,  something 
Apurva  or  miraculous,  which  represented  the  re- 
ward inherent  in  good  works.  And  he  adds,  that  if 
we  supposed  that  the  Lord  himself  caused  rewards 
and  punishments  for  the  acts  of  men,  we  should 
often  have  to  accuse  him  of  cruelty  and  partiality ; 
and  that  it  is  better  therefore  to  allow  that  all 
works,  good  or  bad,  produce  their  own  results,  or,  in 
other  words,  that  for  the  moral  government  of  the 
world  no  Lord  is  wanted. 

Here,  then,  we  see  the  real  state  of  the  case  as 
between  (7aimini  and  Badarayana.  Graimini  would 
not  make  the  Lord  responsible  for  the  injustice  that 
seems  to  prevail  in  the  world,  and  hence  reduced 
everything  to  cause  and  effect,  and  saw  in  the 
inequalities  of  the  world  the  natural  result  of  the 
continued  action  of  good  or  evil  acts.  This  surely 
was  not  atheism,  rather  was  it  an  attempt  to  clear 
the  Lord  from  those  charges  of  cruelty  or  undue 


278  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

partiality  which  have  so  often  been  brought  against 
him.  It  was  but  another  attempt  at  justifying  the 
wisdom  of  God,  an  ancient  Theodicee,  that,  what- 
ever we  may  think  of  it,  certainly  did  not  deserve 
the  name  of  atheism. 

Badarayana,  however,  thought  otherwise,  and 
quoting  himself,  he  says,  '  Badarayana  thinks  the 
Lord  to  be  the  cause  of  the  fruits  of  action/  and 
he  adds  that  he  is  even  the  cause  of  these  actions 
themselves,  as  we  may  learn  from  a  well-known 
Vedic  passage  (Kaush.  Up.  Ill,  8)  :  '  He  makes 
whomsoever  he  wishes  to  lead  up  from  these  worlds, 
do  good  deeds  ;  and  makes  him  whom  he  wishes  to 
lead  down  from  these  worlds,  do  bad  deeds.' 

Atheism  is  a  charge  very  freely  brought  against 
those  who  deny  certain  characteristics  predicated  of 
the  Deity,  but  do  not  mean  thereby  to  deny  its 
existence.  If  the  Mimamsakas  were  called  atheists, 
it  meant  no  more  than  that  they  tried  to  iustify  the 

«/  *J  J 

ways  of  God  in  their  own  way.  But,  once  having 
been  called  atheists,  they  were  accused  of  ever  so 
many  things.  In  a  passage  quoted  by  Professor 
Banerjea  from  a  modern  work,  the  Vidvan-moda- 
tararigmi,  we  read  :  '  They  say  there  is  no  God,  or 
maker  of  the  world  ;  nor  has  the  world  any  sustainer 
or  destroyer  ;  for  every  man  obtains  a  recompense  in 
conformity  with  his  own  works.  Neither  is  there  any 
maker  of  the  Veda,  for  its  words  are  eternal,  and  their 
arrangement  is  eternal.  Its  authoritativeness  is 
self-demonstrated,  for  since  it  has  been  established 
from  all  eternity  how  can  it  be  dependent  upon 
anything  but  itself  ? '  This  shows  how  the  Mimam- 
sakas  have  been  misunderstood  by  the  Vedantists, 
and  how  much  $awkara  is  at  cross-purposes  with 


IS    THE    PURVA-MIMAMSA    A    PHILOSOPHY  ?        279 

(raimini.  What  has  happened  in  this  case  in  India 
is  what  always  happens  when  people  resort  to  names 
of  abuse  rather  than  to  an  exchange  of  ideas.  Surely 
a  Deity,  though  it  does  not  cause  us  to  act,  and 
does  not  itself  reward  or  punish  us,  is  not  thereby 
a  non-existent  Deity.  Modern  Vedantists  also  are 
so  enamoured  of  their  own  conception  of  Deity,  that 
is,  of  Brahman  or  Atman,  that  they  do  not  hesitate, 
like  Vivekananda,  for  instance,  in  his  recent  address 
on  Practical  Vedanta,  1896,  to  charge  those  who 
differ  from  himself  with  atheism.  '  He  is  the  atheist,' 
he  writes,  '  who  does  not  believe  in  himself.  Not 
believing  in  the  glory  of  your  own  soul  is  what  the 
Vedanta  calls  atheism.' 

Is  the  Pftrva-Mimawsa  a  system  of  Philosophy? 

Let  me  say  once  more  that,  in  allowing  a  place  to 
the  Purva-Mimamsa  among  the  six  systems  of  Indian 
Philosophy,  I  was  chiefly  influenced  by  the  fact  that 
from  an  Indian  point  of  view  it  always  held  such 
a  place,  and  that  by  omitting  it  a  gap  would  have 
been  left  in  the  general  outline  of  the  philosophic 
thought  of  India.  Some  native  philosophers  go  so 
far  as  not  only  to  call  both  systems,  that  of  (raimini 
and  Badarayana,  by  the  same  name  of  Mimamsa, 
but  to  look  upon  them  as  forming  one  whole.  They 
actually  take  the  words  in  the  first  Sutra  of  the 
Vedanta-philosophy,  '  Now  then  a  desire  to  know 
Brahman,'  as  pointing  back  to  (raimini's  Sutras  and 
as  thereby  implying  that  the  Purva-Mimamsa  should 
be  studied  first,  and  should  be  followed  by  a  study 
of  the  Uttara-MimamsEi  afterwards.  Besides,  the 
authors  of  the  other  five  systems  frequently  refer  to 
(raimini  as  an  independent  thinker,  and  though  his 


280  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

treatment  of  the  sacrificial  system  of  the  Veda  would 
hardly  seem  to  us  to  deserve  the  name  of  a  system 
of  philosophy,  he  has  nevertheless  touched  on  many 
a  problem  which  falls  clearly  within  that  sphere  of 
thought.  Our  idea  of  a  system  of  philosophy  is 
different  from  the  Indian  conception  of  a  Darsana. 
In  its  original  meaning  philosophy,  as  a  love  of 
wisdom,  comes  nearest  to  the  Sanskrit  6ri(//iasa, 
a  desire  to  know,  if  not  a  desire  to  be  wise.  If 
we  take  philosophy  in  the  sense  of  an  examination 
of  our  means  of  knowledge  (Epistemology),  or  with 
Kant  as  an  inquiry  into  the  limits  of  human  know- 
ledge, there  would  be  nothing  corresponding  to  it  in 
India.  Even  the  Vedanta,  so  far  as  it  is  based,  not 
on  independent  reasoning,  but  on  the  authority  of 
the  /Sruti,  would  lose  \vith  us  its  claim  to  the  title 
of  philosophy.  But  we  have  only  to  waive  the  claim 
of  infallibility  put  forward  by  Badarayana  in  favour 
of  the  utterances  of  the  sages  of  the  Upanishads, 
and  treat  them  as  simple  human  witnesses  to  the 
truth,  and  we  should  then  find  in  the  systematic 
arrangement  of  these  utterances  by  Badarayarza, 
a  real  philosophy,  a  complete  view  of  the  Kosmos  in 
which  we  live,  like  those  that  have  been  put  forward 
by  the  great  thinkers  of  the  philosophical  countries 
of  the  world,  Greece,  Italy,  Germany,  France,  and 
England. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Samkhya-Philosophy. 

HAVING-  explored  two  of  the  recognised  systems 
of  Indian  philosophy,  so  far  as  it  seemed  necessary 
in  a  general  survey  of  the  work  done  by  the  ancient 
thinkers  of  India,  we  must  now  return  and  enter 
once  more  into  the  densely  entangled  and  almost 
impervious  growth  of  thought  from  which  all  the 
high  roads  leading  towards  real  and  definite  systems 
of  philosophy  have  emerged,  branching  off  in  dif- 
ferent directions.  One  of  these  and,  as  it  seems 
to  me,  by  far  the  most  important  for  the  whole 
intellectual  development  of  India,  the  Vedanta, 
has  been  mapped  out  by  us  at  least  in  its  broad 
outlines. 

It  seemed  to  me  undesirable  to  enter  here  on 
an  examination  of  what  has  been  called  the  later 
Vedanta  which  can  be  studied  in  such  works  as 
the  Pan&adasi  or  the  Vedanta-Sara,  and  in  many 
popular  treatises  both  in  prose  and  in  verse. 

Later  Vedanta  mixed  with  Sawkhya. 

It  would  be  unfair  and  unhistorical,  however,  to 
look  upon  this  later  development  of  the  Vedanta  as 
simply  a  deterioration  of  the  old  philosophy.  Though 
it  is  certainly  rather  confused,  if  compared  with  the 
system  as  laid  down  in  the  old  Vedanta-Sfttras, 


282  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

it  represents  to  us  what  in  the  course  of  time 
became  of  the  Vedanta,  when  taught  and  discussed 
in  the  different  schools  of  philosophy  in  medieval 
and  modern  India.  What  strikes  us  most  in  it  is 
the  mixture  of  Vedanta  ideas  with  ideas  borrowed 
chiefly,  as  it  would  seem,  from  Samkhya,  but 
also  from  Yoga,  and  Nyaya  sources.  But  here 
again  it  is  difficult  to  decide  whether  such  ideas 
were  actually  borrowed  from  these  systems  in  their 
finished  state,  or  whether  they  were  originally  com- 
mon property  which  in  later  times  only  had  become 
restricted  to  one  or  the  other  of  the  six  systems  of 
philosophy.  In  the  Pa?U*adasi,  for  instance,  we 
meet  with  the  idea  of  Praknti,  nature,  which  we 
are  accustomed  to  consider  as  the  peculiar  property 
of  the  Sa/mkhya-system.  This  Prakrit!  is  said  there 
to  be  the  reflection,  or,  as  we  should  say,  the  shadow 
of  Brahman,  and  to  be  possessed  of  the  three  Gunas 
or  elements  of  goodness,  passion,  and  darkness,  or, 
as  they  are  sometimes  explained,  of  good,  indifferent, 
and  bad.  This  theory  of  the  three  Gu?;as,  however, 
is  altogether  absent  from  the  original  Vedanta  ;  at 
least,  it  is  not  to  be  met  with  in  the  purely  Veduntic 
Upanishads,  occurring  for  the  first  time  in  the 
/SVetasvatara  Upanishad.  Again  in  the  later  Vedanta 
works  Avidya  and  Maya  are  used  synonymously, 
or,  if  distinguished  from  one  another,  they  are  sup- 
posed to  arise  respectively  from  the  more  or  less 
pure  character  of  their  substance1.  The  omniscient, 
but  personal  tsvara  is  there  explained  as  a  reflection 
of  Maya,  but  as  having  subdued  her,  while  the 


1  I    translate    Sattva    hero    by    substance,    for    the    context 
hardly  allows  that  we  should  take  it  for  the  Guna  of  goodness. 


LATER    VEDANTA    MIXED    WITH    SAJIfKHYA.        283 

individual  soul,  Pragma  or  6riva,  is  represented  as 
having  been  subdued  by  Avidya,  and  to  be  multi- 
form, owing  to  the  variety  of  Avidya.  The  individual 
soul,  being  endowed  with  a  causal  or  subtle  body, 
believes  that  body  to  be  its  own,  and  hence  error 
and  suffering  in  all  their  variety.  As  to  the  de- 
velopment of  the  world,  we  are  told  that  it  was 
by  the  command  of  Isvara  that  PrakHti,  when 
dominated  by  darkness,  produced  the  elements  of 
ether,  a,ir,  fire,  water  and  earth,  all  meant  to  be 
enjoyed,  that  is,  to  be  experienced  by  the  individual 
souls. 

In  all  this  we  can  hardly  be  mistaken  if  we 
recognise  the  influence  of  Samkhya  ideas,  obscuring 
and  vitiating  the  monism  of  the  Vedanta,  pure  and 
simple.  In  that  philosophy  there  is  no  room  for  a 
Second,  or  for  a  Prakn'ti,  nor  for  the  three  Gums, 
nor  for  anything  real  by  the  side  of  Brahman. 

How  that  influence  was  exercised  we  cannot 
discover,  and  it  is  possible  that  in  ancient  times 
already  there  existed  this  influence  of  one  philo- 
sophical system  upon  the  other,  for  we  see  even 
in  some  of  the  Upanishads  a  certain  mixture  of 
what  we  should  afterwards  have  to  call  the  dis- 
tinctive teaching  of  Vedanta,  Samkhya,  or  Yoga- 
philosophy.  We  must  remember  that  in  India  the 
idea  of  private  property  in  any  philosophic  truth 
did  hardly  exist.  The  individual,  as  we  saw  before, 
was  of  little  consequence,  and  could  never  exercise 
the  same  influence  which  such  thinkers  as  Socrates 
or  Plato  exercised  in  Greece.  If  the  descriptions  of 
Indian  life  emanating  from  the  Indians  themselves, 
and  from  other  nations  they  came  in  contact  with, 
whether  Greek  conquerors  or  Chinese  pilgrims,  can 


284  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

be  trusted,  we  may  well  understand  that  truth, 
or  what  was  taken  to  be  truth,  was  treated  not 
as  private,  but  as  common  property.  If  there  was 
an  exchange  of  ideas  among  the  Indian  seekers 
after  truth,  it  was  far  more  in  the  nature  of  co- 
operation towards  a  common  end,  than  in  the 
assertion  of  any  claims  of  originality  or  priority 
by  individual  teachers.  That  one  man  should  write 
and  publish  his  philosophical  views  in  a  book  ;  and 
that  another  should  read  and  criticise  that  book 
or  carry  on  the  work  where  it  had  been  left,  was 
never  thought  of  in  India  in  ancient  times.  If 
A.  referred  to  B.  often,  as  they  say,  from  mere 
civility,  Pm/artham,  B.  would  refer  to  A.,  but  no 
one  would  ever  say,  as  so  often  happens  with  us, 
that  he  had  anticipated  the  discovery  of  another, 
or  that  some  one  else  had  stolen  his  ideas.  Truth 
was  not  an  article  that,  according  to  Hindu  ideas, 
could  ever  be  stolen.  All  that  could  happen  and 
did  happen  was  that  certain  opinions  which  had 
been  discussed,  sifted,  and  generally  received  in 
one  Asrama,  hermitage,  Arama,  garden,  or  Parishad, 
religious  settlement,  would  in  time  be  collected 
by  its  members  and  reduced  to  a  more  or  less 
systematic  form.  What  that  form  was  in  early 
times  we  may  see  from  the  Brahmanas,  and  more 
particularly  from  the  Upanishads,  i.  e.  Seances, 
gatherings  of  pupils  round  their  teachers,  or  later  on 
from  the  Sutras.  It  cannot  be  doubted  that  these 
Sutras  presuppose,  by  their  systematic  form,  a  long 
continued  intellectual  labour,  nay  it  seems  to  me 
difficult  to  account  for  their  peculiar  literary  form 
except  on  the  ground  that  they  were  meant  to  be 
learnt  by  heart  and  to  be  accompanied  from  the  very 


LATER    VEDANTA    MIXED    WITH    SA3/KHYA.        285 

beginning  by  a  running  commentary,  without  which 
they  would  have  been  perfectly  unintelligible.  I  sug- 
gested once  before  that  this  very  peculiar  style  of 
the  Sutras  would  receive  the  best  historical  expla- 
nation, if  it  could  be  proved  that  they  represent 
the  first  attempts  at  writing  for  literary  purposes 
in  India.  Whatever  the  exact  date  may  be  of 
the  introduction  of  a  sinistrorsum  and  dextrorsum 
alphabet  for  epigraphic  purposes  in  India  (and  in  spite 
of  all  efforts  not  a  single  inscription  has  as  yet  been 
discovered  that  can  be  referred  with  certainty  to  the 
period  before  Asoka,  third  century  B.  c.),  every  classical 
scholar  knows  that  there  always  is  a  long  interval 
between  an  epigraphic  and  a  literary  employment 
of  the  alphabet.  People  forget  that  a  period  marked 
by  written  literary  compositions  requires  a  public, 
and  a  large  public,  which  is  able  to  read,  for  where 
there  is  no  demand  there  is  no  supply.  Nor  must 
we  forget  that  the  old  system  of  a  mnemonic 
literature,  the  Parampara,  wras  invested  with  a  kind 
of  sacred  character,  and  would  not  have  been  easily 
surrendered.  The  old  mnemonic  system  was  upheld 
by  a  strict  discipline  which  formed  the  principal 
part  of  the  established  system  of  education  in  India, 
as  has  been  fully  described  in  the  Prati.sakhyas. 
They  explain  to  us  by  what  process,  whatever 
existed  at  that  time  of  literature,  chiefly  sacred, 
was  firmly  imprinted  on  the  memory  of  the  young. 
These  young  pupils  were  in  fact  the  books,  the 
scribes  were  the  Gurus,  the  tablet  was  the  brain. 
We  can  hardly  imagine  such  a  state  of  literature, 
and  the  transition  from  it  to  a  written  literature 
must  have  marked  a  new  start  in  the  intellectual 
life  of  the  people  at  large,  or  at  least  of  the  educated 


286  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

classes.  Anybody  who  has  come  in  contact  with 
the  Pandits  of  India  has  been  able  to  observe  the 
wonderful  feats  that  can  be  achieved  by  that 
mnemonic  discipline  even  at  present,  though  it  is 
dying  out  before  our  eyes  at  the  approach  of  printed 
books,  nay  of  printed  editions  of  their  own  sacred 
texts.  I  need  hardly  say  that  even  if  Biihler's 
.  idea  of  the  introduction  of  a  Semitic  alphabet  into 
India  by  means  of  commercial  travellers  about  800 
or  1000  B.C.  were  more  than  a  hypothesis,  it  would 
not  prove  the  existence  of  a  written  literature  at 
that  time.  The  adaptation  of  a  Semitic  alphabet 
to  the  phonetic  system  as  elaborated  in  the  Prati- 
sakhyas  may  date  from  the  third,  possibly  from 
the  fourth  century  B.C.,  but  the  use  of  that  alphabet 
for  inscriptions  begins  in  the  middle  of  the  third 
century  only ;  and  though  we  cannot  deny  the 
possibility  of  its  having  been  used  for  literary  pur- 
poses at  the  same  time,  such  possibilities  would 
form  very  dangerous  landmarks  in  the  chronology 
of  Indian  literature. 

But  whatever  the  origin  of  the  peculiar  Sutra- 
literature  may  have  been — and  I  give  my  hypothesis 
as  a  hypothesis  only — all  scholars  will  probably 
agree  that  these  Sutras  could  not  be  the  work  of  one 
individual  philosopher,  but  that  we  have  in  them  the 
last  outcome  of  previous  centuries  of  thought,  and 
the  final  result  of  the  labours  of  numerous  thinkers 
whose  names  are  forgotten  and  will  never  be 
recovered. 

Relative  Age  of  Philosophies  and  Sfttras. 

If  we  keep  this  in  mind,  we  shall  see  that  the 
question  whether  any  of  the  texts  of  the  six  philo- 


RELATIVE  AGE  OF  PHILOSOPHIES  AND  SUTRAS.        287 

sophies  which  we  now  possess  should  be  considered 
as  older  than  any  other,  is  really  a  question  im- 
possible to  answer.  The  tests  for  settling  the 
relative  ages  of  literary  works,  applicable  to  Euro- 
pean literature,  are  not  applicable  to  Indian  litera- 
ture. Thus,  if  one  Greek  author  quotes  another, 
we  feel  justified  in  taking  the  one  who  is  quoted 
as  the  predecessor  or  contemporary  of  the  one 
who  quotes.  But  because  G'aimini  quotes  Bada- 
rayawa  and  Badarayafta  6raimini,  and  because 
their  systems  show  an  acquaintance  with  the  other 
five  systems  of  philosophy,  we  have  no  right  to 
arrange  them  in  chronological  succession.  Kanada, 
who  is  acquainted  with  Kapila,  is  clearly  criti- 
cised by  Kapila,  at  least  in  our  Kapila-Sutras. 
Kapila,  to  whom  the  S&mkhya-Sutras  are  ascribed, 
actually  adopts  one  of  Badarayana's  Sutras,  IV,  i ,  i , 
and  inserts  it  totidem  verbis  in  his  own  work,  IV,  3. 
He  does  the  same  for  the  Yoga-Sutras  I,  5  and  II,  46, 
which  occur  in  II,  33,  III,  34,  and  VI,  24  in  the 
Sawkhya-Sutras  which  we  possess.  Ka^ada  was 
clearly  acquainted  with  Gotama,  while  Gotama 
attacks  in  turn  certain  doctrines  of  Kapila  and  Bada- 
rayana.  It  has  been  supposed,  because  Patan^ali 
ignores  all  other  systems,  that  therefore  he  was 
anterior  to  all  of  them  l.  But  all  such  conclusions, 
which  would  be  perfectly  legitimate  in  Greek  and 
Latin  literature,  have  no  weight  whatever  in  the 
literary  history  of  India,  because  during  its  mnemonic 
period  anything  could  be  added  and  anything  left 
out,  before  each  system  reached  the  form  in  which 
we  possess  it. 

1  Kajendralal  Mitra,  I.e.,  p.  xviii. 


288  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Age  of  Kapila-Sfttras. 

The  Sutras  of  Kapila,  which  have  come  down  to 
us,  are  so  little  the  work  of  the  founder  of  that 
system,  that  it  would  be  far  safer  to  treat  them  as 
the  last  arrangement  of  doctrines  accumulated  in  one 
philosophical  school  during  centuries  of  Parampanl 
or  tradition.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  the  Yoga- 
philosophy  presupposes  a  Sa?7ikhya-philosophy,  but 
while  Pata%ali,  the  reputed  author  of  Yoga-Sutras 
has  been  referred  to  the  second  century  B.C.,  it  is 
now  generally  admitted  that  our  Sawkhya- Sutras 
cannot  be  earlier  than  the  fourteenth  century  A.D. 
It  is  necessary  to  distinguish  carefully  between  the 
six  philosophies  as  so  many  channels  of  thought, 
and  the  Sutras  which  embody  their  teachings  and 
have  been  handed  down  to  us  as  the  earliest  docu- 
ments within  our  reach.  Yoga,  as  a  technical 
term,  occurs  earlier  than  the  name  of  any  other 
system  of  philosophy.  It  occurs  in  the  Taittiriya 
and  Ka^Aa  Upanishads,  and  is  mentioned  in  as 
early  an  authority  as  the  Asvalayana-Gn'hya- 
Sutras.  In  the  Maitray.  Up.  VI,  10  we  meet  even 
with  Yogins.  But  it  by  no  means  follows  that  the 
Yoga,  known  in  those  early  times,  was  the  same 
as  what  we  possess  in  Pata/lr/ali's  Sutras  of  the 
Yoga-philosophy.  We  look  in  vain  in  the  so-called 
classical  Upanishads  for  the  names  of  either  Samkhya 
or  Vedanta,  but  Sa/wkhya  occurs  in  the  compound 
Samkhya-Yoga  in  the  /SVetasvatara  Up.  VI,  i  3  and 
in  several  of  the  minor  Upanishads.  It  should  be 
observed  that  Vedanta  also  occurs  for  the  first  time 
in  the  same  SVetasvatara  VI,  22,  and  afterwards  in 
the  smaller  Upanishads.  All  such  indications  may 


AGE    OF    KAPILA-SUTKAS.  289 

become  valuable  hereafter  for  chronological  purposes. 
In  the  Bhagavad-git£  IJ,  39  we  meet  with  the  Sam- 
khya  as  the  name  of  a  system  of  philosophy  and 
likewise  as  a  name  of  its  adherents,  V,  5. 

As  to  our  Samkhya-Sutras  their  antiquity  was  first 
shaken  by  Dr.  FitzEdward  Hall.  Va&aspati  Misra,  the 
author  of  the  Samkhya-tattva-Kaumudi,  who,  accord- 
ing to  Professor  Garbe,  can  be  safely  referred  to 
about  1150  A.  D.,  quotes  not  a  single  Sutra  from  our 
Samkhya-Sutras,  but  appeals  to  older  authorities 
only,  such  as  PaMasikha,  Varshaganya,  and  the 
Ra^avcartika.  Even  Madhava  about  1350  A.  D.,  who 
evidently  knew  the  Sutras  of  the  other  systems, 
never  quotes  from  our  Samkhya-Sutras  ;  and  why 
not,  if  they  had  been  in  existence  in  his  time  ? 

But  we  must  not  go  too  far.  It  by  no  means 
follows  that  every  one  of  the  Sutras  which  we  possess 
in  the  body  of  the  Samkhya-Sutras,  and  the  com- 
position of  which  is  assigned  by  Balasastrin  to  so 
late  a  period  as  the  sixteenth  century,  is  of  that 
modern  date.  He  declares  that  they  were  all  com- 
posed by  the  well-known  Vi^/nana-Bhikshu  who,  as 
was  then  the  fashion,  wrote  also  a  commentary  on 
them.  It  is  quite  possible  that  our  Samkhya-Sutras 
may  only  be  what  we  should  call  the  latest  recension 
of  the  old  Sutras.  We  know  that  in  India  the  oral 
tradition  of  certain  texts,  as,  for  instance,  the  Sutras 
of  Panini,  was  interrupted  for  a  time  and  then 
restored  again,  whether  from  scattered  MSS.,  or 
from  the  recollection  of  less  forgetful  or  forgotten 
individuals.  If  that  was  the  case,  as  we  know,  with 
so  voluminous  a  work  as  the  Mahabhashya  ;  why 
should  not  certain  portions  of  the  Samkhya-Sutras 
have  been  preserved  here  and  there,  and  have  been 

TJ 


290  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

added  to  or  remodelled  from  time  to  time,  till  they 
meet  us  at 'last  in  their  final  form,  at  so  late  a  date 
as  the  fourteenth  or  even  the  sixteenth  century  ? 
It  was  no  doubt  a  great  shock  to  those  who  stood 
up  for  the  great  antiquity  of  Indian  philosophy,  to 
have  to  confess  that  a  work  for  which  a  most  remote 
date  had  always  been  claimed,  may  not  be  older 
than  the  time  of  Des  Cartes,  at  least  in  that  final 
literary  form  in  which  it  has  reached  us.  But  if  we 
consider  the  circumstances  of  the  case,  it  .is  more 
than  possible  that  our  Sutras  of  the  Samkhya- 
philosophy  contain  some  of  the  most  ancient  as 
well  as  the  most  modern  Sutras,  the  utterances  of 
Kapila,  Asuri,  PafU-asikha  and  Varshaga?iya,  as  well 
as  those  of  Lsvara-KHshfta  and  even  of  Vigwana- 
Bhikshu. 

Sawkhya-karikfts. 

But  if  we  must  accept  so  very  modern  a  date  for 
our  Kapila-Sutras,  we  are  fortunate  in  being  able  to 
assign  a  much  earlier  and  much  more  settled  date 
to  another  work  which  for  centuries  seems  to  have 
formed  the  recognised  authority  for  the  followers 
of  the  Sa?7ikhya  in  India,  the  so-called  Sawkhya- 
karikas  or  the  sixty- nine  or  seventy  Versus 
memoriales  of  Isvara-Krtshna  (with  three  supple- 
mentary ones,  equally  ascribed  to  that  author). 
That  these  Karikas  are  older  than  our  Sutras  could 
easily  be  proved  by  passages  occurring  among  the 
Sutras  which  are  almost  literally  taken  from  the 
Karikas  1. 

Alberuni,  who  wrote  his  account  of  India  in  the 

1  See  Hall,  Samkhya-Sara,  p.  12  ;  Deusscn,  Vedanta,  p.  361. 


SAMKHYA-KARIKAS.  29! 

first  half  of  the  eleventh  century,  was  well  ac- 
quainted not  only  with  Lsvara-K?^'shna's  work,  but 
likewise,  as  has  been  shown,  with  Gauc/apada's 
commentary  on  it1.  Nay,  we  can  even  make 
another  step  backward.  For  the  Samkhya-karikas 
exist  in  a  Chinese  translation  also,  made  by  .Kan-ti 
(lit.  true  truth),  possibly  Paramartha,  a  Tripkaka 
law-teacher  of  the  Kh&\\  dynasty,  A.D.  557  to  589 
(not  583).  Paramartha  came  to  China  in  about 
547  A.D.  in  the  reign  of  the  Emperor  Wu-ti  of  the 
Lian  dynasty  which  ruled  in  Southern  China  from 
502  to  557  A.D.2,  and  was  followed  by  the  Kh&n 
dynasty.  He  lived  till  582  A.D.  ;  and  there  are  no 
less  than  twenty-eight  of  his  translations  now  in 
existence,  that  of  the  Suvama-Saptati-sastra  being 
the  twenty-seventh  (No.  1,300  in  B.  Nanjio's 
Catalogue).  The  name  given  to  it  in  Chinese,  '  the 
Golden  Seventy  Discourse,'  is  supposed  to  refer  to 
the  number  of  verses  in  the  Karika.  TTan-ti  was  not 
considered  a  good  Chinese  scholar,  and  his  trans- 
lation of  the  Abhidharma-Kosha-sastra,  for  instance, 
had  in  consequence  to  be  replaced  by  a  new  trans- 
lation by  Hiouen-thsang. 

But  though  we  are  thus  enabled  to  assign  the 
Samkhya-karika  to  the  sixth  century  A.D.,  it  by 
no  means  follows  that  this  work  itself  did  not 
exist  before  that  time.  Native  tradition,  we  are 
told,  assigns  his  work  to  the  first  century  B.C. 


1  Garbe,  Sawkhya  und  Yoga,  p.  7. 

2  See  Mayer's  Chinese  Header's  Manual,  which  gives  the  exact 
dates. 


U   2 


292  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Date  of  Gatif/apada. 

But  even  here  new  difficulties  arise  with  regard 
to  the  age  of  Gauc?apada,  the  author  of  the  com- 
mentary on  the  Karikas.  This  commentary  also,  so 
we  were  informed  by  Beal,  had  been  translated  into 
Chinese  before  582  A.D.  ;  but  how  is  that  possible 
without  upsetting  the  little  we  know  of  Gauc/apada's 
date  ?  $a?7ikara  is  represented  as  the  pupil  of 
Govinda  who  was  the  pupil  of  Gauc^apada.  But 
$arakara's  literary  career  began,  as  is  generally 
supposed,  about  788  A.  D.  How  then  could  he  have 
been  the  literary  grandson  of  Gauc/apada,  and  son 
or  pupil  of  Govinda  ?  As  Mr.  Beal  could  no  longer  be 
consulted  I  asked  one  of  my  Chinese  pupils,  the  late 
Mr.  Kasawara,  to  translate  portions  of  the  Chinese 
commentary  for  me ;  but  the  specimens  he  sent  me 
did  not  suffice  to  settle  the  question  whether  it  was 
really  a  translation  of  Gauc?apada's  commentary.  It 
is  but  right  to  state  here  that  Telang  in  the  Indian 
Antiquary,  XIII,  95,  places  /Samkara  much  earlier, 
in  590  A.D.,  and  that  Fleet,  in  the  Indian  Antiquary, 
Jan.,  1887,  assigns  630  to  655  as  the  latest  date  to 
King  Vrishadeva  of  Nepal  who  is  said  to  have  re- 
ceived $a7ftkara  at  his  court,  and  actually  to  have 
given  the  name  of  $a?ftkaradeva  to  his  son  in  honour 
of  the  philosopher.  In  order  to  escape  from  all  these 
uncertainties  I  wrote  once  more  to  Japan  to  another 
pupil  of  mine,  Dr.  Takakusu,  and  he,  after  carefully 
collating  the  Chinese  translation  with  the  Sanskrit 
commentary  of  Gauc/apiida,  informed  me  that  the 
Chinese  translation  of  the  commentary  was  not,  and 
could  not  in  any  sense  be  called,  a  translation  of 
Gauc/apada's  commentary.  So  much  trouble  may 


DATE    OF    GAUDAPADA.  293 

be  caused  by  one  unguarded  expression !     Anyhow 
this  difficulty  is  now  removed,  and  /Samkara's  date 
need  not  be  disturbed.     The  author  of  the  Karikas 
informs  us  at  the  end  of  his  work  that  this  philo- 
sophy, proclaimed  by  the  greatest  sage,  i.  e.  Kapila, 
had  been  communicated  by  him  to  Asuri,  by  Asuri 
to  Pa?iA;asikha,  and,  as  the  Tattva-samasa  adds,  from 
Pan&asikha   to   Patan^ali l,  and   had   been  widely 
taught  until,  by  an  uninterrupted  series  of  teachers, 
it  reached  even  Isvara-Kri'shria 2.     He  calls  it  the 
Shashd-tantra,  the    Sixty-doctrine.     A  similar   ac- 
count is  given  by  Paramartha  in  his  comment  on 
the  first  verse, '  Kipila  (Kapila)/  he  says, '  was  a  jRishi 
descended  from  the  sky  and  was  endowed  with  the 
four  virtues,  dutifulness  (Dharma),  wisdom  (Pragma), 
separation   from    desires  (Vairagya),    and    freedom 
(Moksha).      He   saw  a   Brahman    of  the   name    of 
O-shu-li  (Asuri)  who  had  been  worshipping  heaven 
or  the  Devas  for  a  thousand  years,  and  said  to  him  : 
'  0    Asuri,  art   thou   satisfied  with   the  state  of  a 
GHhastha  or  householder  ?     After  a  thousand  years 
he   came  again,   and  Asuri  admitted  that  he  was 
satisfied  with  the  state  of  a  GHhastha.     He  then 
came  a  third  time  to  Asuri,  whereupon  Asuri  quitted 
the  state  of  a  householder  and  became  a  pupil  of 
Kapila.'     These   may  be  mere  additions  made   by 
Paramartha,  but  they  show,  at  all  events,  that  to 
him  also  Kapila  and  Asuri  were  persons  of  a  distant 
past. 


1  This  would  seem  to  place  the  Tattva-samasa  later  than 
Pata%ali. 

2  See  Karika,  vv.  70,  71. 


294  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Tattva-samasa. 

But  however  far  the  Karikas  of 
may  go  back,  they  are  what  they  are,  a  metrical 
work  in  the  style  of  a  later  age,  an  age  that  gave 
rise  to  other  Karikas  like  BhartHhari's  (about 
650  A.  D.)  Karikas  on  grammar.  Everybody  has 
wondered,  therefore,  what  could  have  become  of  the 
real  Samkhya-Sutras,  if  they  ever  existed  ;  or,  if 
they  did  not,  why  there  should  never  have  been 
such  Sutras  for  so  important  a  system  of  philosophy 
as  the  Samkhya.  There  is  clearly  a  great  gap  between 
the  end  of  the  Upanishad  period  and  the  literary 
period  that  was  able  to  give  rise  to  the  metrical 
w.ork  of  Isvara-Kristma.  In  what  form  could  the 
Samkhya-philosophy  have  existed  in  that  interval  ? 

To  judge  from  analogy  we  should  certainly  say, 
in  the  form  of  Sutras,  such  as  were  handed  down 
for  other  branches  of  learning  by  oral  tradition. 
The  Karikas  themselves  presuppose  such  a  tradition 
quite  as  much  as  the  much  later  Sutras  which  we 
possess.  They  are  both  meant  to  recapitulate  what 
existed,  never  to  originate  what  we  should  call  new 
and  original  thoughts.  When  we  see  the  Karikas 
declare  that  they  leave  out  on  purpose  the  Akhayikas, 
the  illustrative  stories  contained  in  the  fourth  book 
of  our  Sutras,  this  cannot  prove  their  posteriority 
to  the  Sutras  as  we  have  them  ;  but  it  shows  that 
at  Isvara-Knshna's  time  there  existed  a  body  of 
Samkhya-philosophy  which  contained  such  stories 
as  we  find  in  our  modern  Sutras,  but  neither  in  the 
Karikas  nor  in  the  Tattva-samasa.  Besides  these 
stories  other  things  also  were  omitted  by  I.svara- 
K/'i'shna,  comprehended  under  the  name  of  Para- 


TATTVA-SAMASA.  295 

v4da,  probably  controversies,  sucb  as  those  on  the 
necessity  of  an  Isvara. 

Under  these  circumstances  I  venture  to  say  that 
such  a  work  in  Sutras  not  only  existed,  but  that 
we  are  in  actual  possession  of  it,  namely  in  the 
text  of  the  much  neglected  Tattva-samasa.  Because 
it  contains  a  number  of  new  technical  terms,  it  has 
been  put  down  at  once  as  modern,  as  if  what  is  new 
to  us  must  be  new  chronologically  also.  We  know 
far  too  little  of  the  history  of  the  Samkhya  to  justify 
so  confident  a  conclusion.  Colebrooke l  told  us 
long  ago  that,  if  the  scholiast  of  Kapila2  may  be 
trusted,  and  why  should  he  not  ?  the  Tattva-samasa 
was  the  proper  text-book  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy. 
It  was  a  mere  accident  that  he,  Colebrooke,  could 
not  find  a  copy  of  it.  '  Whether  that  Tattva-samasa 
of  Kapila  be  extant,'  he  wrote,  '  or  whether  the 
Sutras  of  Paw&asikha  be  so,  is  not  certain.'  And 
again  he  wrote  :  '  It  appears  from  the  Preface  of 
the  Kapila-bhashya  that  a  more  compendious  tract 
in  the  form  of  Sutras  or  aphorisms,  bears  the  title 
of  Tattva-samasa,  and  is  ascribed  to  the  same  author, 
i.  e.  to  Kapila. 

I  admit  that  the  introductory  portion  of  this 
tract  sounds  modern,  and  probably  is  so,  but  I  find 
no  other  marks  of  a  modern  date  in  the  body  of  the 
work.  On  the  contrary  there  are  several  indications 
in  it  of  its  being  an  earlier  form  of  the  Samkhya- 
philosophy  than  what  we  possess  in  the  Karikas  or 
in  the  Sutras.  When  it  agrees  with  the  Karikas, 
sometimes  almost  verbatim,  it  is  the  metrical  text 


1  Essays,  I,  p.  244. 

2  Sawkhya-prava&ana-bhashya,  pp.  7,  no. 


296  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

that  seems  to  me  to  presuppose  the  prose,  not  the 
prose  the  metrical  version.  In  the  Sutras  themselves 
we  find  no  allusion  as  yet  to  the  atheistic  or  non- 
theistic  doctrines  which  distinguish  the  later  texts 
of  the  Samkhya,  and  which  are  still  absent  from  the 
Samkhya-karikas  also.  The  so-called  Aisvaryas  or 
superhuman  powers,  which  are  recognised  in  the 
Tattva-samasa,  might  seem  to  presuppose  the  re- 
cognition of  an  Isvara,  though  this  is  very  doubtful ; 
but  the  direct  identification  of  Purusha  with  Brahman 
in  the  Tattva-samasa  points  certainly  to  an  earlier 
and  less  pronounced  Nirisvara  or  Lord-less  character 
of  the  ancient  Samkhya.  It  should  also  be  mentioned 
that  Vi^wana-Bhikshu,  no  mean  authority  on  such 
matters,  and  even  supposed  by  some  to  have  been 
himself  the  author  of  our  modern  Samkhya-Sutras, 
takes  it  for  granted  that  the  Tattva-samasa  was 
certainly  prior  to  the  Kapila-Sutras  which  we  possess. 
For  why  should  he  defend  Kapila,  and  not  the 
author  of  the  Tattva-samasa,  against  the  charge  of 
Punarukti  or  giving  us  a  mere  useless  repetition, 
and  why  should  he  have  found  no  excuse  for  the 
existence  of  the  Kapila-Sutras  except  that  they  are 
short  and  complete,  while  the  Tattva-samasa  is  short 
and  compact 1  ? 

Not  being  able  to  find  a  MS.  of  the  Tattva-samasa 
Colebrooke  decided  to  translate  instead  the  Sa?»khya- 
karikas,  and  thus  it  came  to  pass  that  most  scholars 
have  been  under  the  impression  that  in  India  also 
this  metrical  version  was  considered  as  the  most 
authoritative  and  most  popular  manual  of  the  Sam- 
khya-philosophy.  This  is  the  way  in  which  certain 

1  Sawkhya-prava&ana-bhashya,  Introduction. 


TATTVA-SAMASA.  297 

prepossessions  arise.  We  have  learnt  since  from 
Ballantyne l  that  at  Benares,  where  he  resided,  these 
Karikas  were  hardly  known  at  all  except  to  those 
who  had  seen  Professor  Wilson's  English  edition  of 
them,  while  the  Tattva-samasa  was  well  known  to 
all  the  native  assistants  whom  he  employed.  Nor 
can  we  doubt  that  in  the  part  of  India  best  known 
to  Ballantyne  it  was  really  an  important  and  popular 
work,  if  we  consider  the  number  of  commentaries 
written  on  it 2,  and  the  frequency  of  allusions  to  it 
which  occur  in  other  commentaries.  The  com- 
mentary published  by  Ballantyne  is,  if  I  understand 
him  rightly,  anonymous.  It  gives  first  what  it  calls 
the  S&mkhya-Sutrara,  and  then  the  Samasakhya- 
stitra-vritti/z..  Hall,  I.e.,  p.  13,  quotes  one  com- 
mentary by  Kshemananda,  called  Samkhya-krama- 
dipika,  but  it  is  not  quite  clear  to  me  whether  this 
is  the  same  as  the  one  published  by  Ballantyne,  nor 
have  I  had  access  to  any  other  MSS. 

We  must  not  forget  that  in  modern  times  the 
Samkhya-philosophy  has  ceased  to  be  popular  in 
several  parts  of  India.  Even  in  the  sixteenth 
century  Vi^nana-Bhikshu,  in  his  commentary  on  the 
Samkhya-Sutras  (v.  5),  complains  that  it  has  been 
swallowed  up  by  the  sun  of  the  time,  and  that  but 
a  small  part  of  the  moon  of  knowledge  remained ; 
while  in  the  Bhagavata  Purana  I,  3,  10,  the  Samkhya 
is  spoken  of  as  Kala-vipluta,  destroyed  by  time. 
Professor  Wilson  told  me  that,  during  the  whole  of 
his  intercourse  with  learned  natives,  he  met  with  one 
Brahman  only  who  professed  to  be  acquainted  with  the 

1  Drift  of  the  Sawkhya,  p.  i. 

2  Five  are  mentioned  by  Hall  in  his  Preface,  p.  33. 


298  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

writings  of  this  philosophical  school,  and  Professor 
Bhandarkar  (1.  c.,  p.  3)  states  that  the  very  name  of 
Sawkhya-prava&ana  was  unknown  on  his  side  of 
India.  Hence  we  may  well  understand  that  Sawkhya 
MSS.  are  scarce  in  India,  and  entirely  absent  in 
certain  localities.  It  is  possible  also  that  the  very 
smallness  of  the  Tattva-samasa  may  have  lowered 
it  in  the  eyes  of  native  scholars,  and  that  in  time  it 
may  have  been  eclipsed  by  its  more  voluminous 
commentaries.  But  if  we  accept  it  as  what  it  pro- 
fesses to  be,  and  what,  up  to  the  time  of  Vign&na.- 
Bhikshu  at  least,  it  was  considered  to  be  in  India, 
it  seems  to  me  just  the  book  that  was  wanted  to 
fill  the  gap  to  which  I  referred  before.  By  itself  it 
would  fill  a  few  pages  only.  In  fact  it  is  a  mere 
enumeration  of  topics,  and,  as  such,  it  would  agree 
very  well  with  the  somewhat  puzzling  name  of 
Samkhya,  which  means  no  more  than  enumeration. 
All  other  derivations  of  this  title  seem  far-fetched  1 
as  compared  with  this.  According  to  Vi^/lana- 
Bhikshu  in  his  commentary  on  the  Sutras  (pp.  6,  1 10), 
ed.  Hall,  both  the  Samkhya-Sutras  and  the  Yoga- 
Sutras  are  really  mere  developments  of  the  Tattva- 
samasa-Sutras.  Both  are  called  therefore  Sa?>ikhya- 
prava&ana,  exposition  of  the  Samkhya,  the  latter 
adding  the  peculiar  arguments  in  support  of  the 
existence  of  an  Lsvara  or  Supreme  Lord,  and  there- 
fore called  Sesvara,  in  opposition  to  the  Sawkhya, 
which  is  called  An-i.s-vara,  or  Lord-less. 

And  here  it  is  important  to  remark  also  that 
the  name  of  Shashh-tantra,  the  Doctrine  of  the  Sixty, 

1  They  are  mentioned  in  the  Preface  to  Hall's  edition  of  tho 
Samkhya-pravaA'ana-bhashya,  1856.  Some  of  them  are  mere 
definitions  without  any  attempt  at  etymology. 


TATTVA-SAMASA.  299 

which  is  given  by  Isvara-Krtstwa,  or  at  all  events 
by  the  author  of  the  72nd  of  his  Karikas,  should 
occur  and  be  accounted  for  in  the  Tattva-samasa, 
as  containing  the  17  (enumerated  in  64  and  65),  and 
the  33,  previously  exhibited  in  62  and  63,  together 
with  the  10  Mulikarthas  or  fundamental  facts  which 
together  would  make  up  the  sixty  topics  of  the 
Shashri-tantra.  At  the  end  of  the  25  great  topics  of 
the  Tattva-samasa  we  find  the  straightforward  de- 
claration :  '  Iti  tattva-samasakhya-samkhya-sutrani/ 
Here  end  the  Samkhya-Sutras  called  Tattva-samasa. 
At  first  sight,  no  doubt,  Samasa  seems  to  mean 
a  mere  abstract ;  but  Samasa  may  be  used  also  in 
opposition  to  BHhat,  and  there  is  no  other  work 
in  existence  of  which  it  could  be  called  an  abstract, 
certainly  not  either  of  the  Karikas  or  of  the  modern 
Sutras,  such  as  we  possess  them.  The  whole  arrange- 
ment is  different  from  the  other  and  more  recent 
treatments  of  Samkhya  -  philosophy.  The  three 
kinds  of  pain,  for  instance,  which  generally  form  the 
starting-point  of  the  whole  system,  are  relegated 
to  the  very  end  as  a  separate  topic.  We  meet 
with  technical  subjects  and  technical  terms  which 
are  'not  to  be  found  at  all  in  other  and,  as  it 
would  seem,  more  modern  Samkhya  works.  The 
smallness  of  the  Tattva-samasa  can  hardly  be  used 
as  an  argument  against  its  ever  having  been  an 
important  work,  for  we  find  similar  short,  yet  old 
Sutra-works,  for  instance,  the  Sarvanukrama  and 
other  Anukramanis  described  in  my  History  of 
Ancient  Sanskrit  Literature1.  However,  in  matters 

1  These  Anukramas  have  been  very  carefully  published  in 
the  Anecdota  Oxoniensia  by  Professor  Macdonell.  to  whom 
I  had  handed  over  my  materials. 


300  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  this  kind  we  must  avoid  being  too  positive  either 
in  denying  or  asserting  the  age  and  authenticity 
of  Sanskrit  texts.  All  I  can  say  is  that  there  is 
no  mark  of  modern  age  in  their  language,  though 
the  commentary  is,  no  doubt,  of  a  later  date.  What 
weighs  with  me  is  the  fact  that  Indian  Pandits 
evidently  considered  the  Tattva-samasa-Sutras  as 
the  original  outlines  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy, 
while  the  idea  that  they  are  a  later  spurious  pro- 
duction rests,  as  far  as  I  can  see  at  present,  on  no 
real  argument  whatever. 

Anteriority  of  Vedanta  or  Sawkhya. 

It  must  be  clear  from  all  this  how  useless  it 
would  be,  with  the  limited  means  at  our  disposal, 
to  attempt  to  prove  the  anteriority  either  of  the 
Vedanta  or  of  the  Samkhya,  as  systems  of  philo- 
sophy, and  as  distinguished  from  the  Sutras  in  which 
we  possess  them.  External  or  historical  evidence 
we  have  none,  and  internal  evidence,  though  it  may 
support  a  suggestion,  can  but  seldom  amount  to 
positive  proof.  We  can  understand  how,  out 
of  the  seeds  scattered  about  in  the  Upanishads, 
there  could  arise  in  time  the  systematic  arrange- 
ment and  final  representation  of  systems  such  as 
have  been  handed  down  to  us  in  the  Sutras  of 
the  Vedanta,  the  Sa»tkhya,  and  the  other  schools. 
It  cannot  be  denied  that  in  the  Upanishad  period 
Vedantic  ideas  are  certainly  more  prevalent  than 
those  of  the  Sa/mkhya.  I  go  even  a  step  further 
and  admit  that  the  Sawikhya-philosophy  may  have 
been  a  kind  of  toning  down  of  the  extreme  Monism 
of  the  Advaita  Vedanta.  I  think  we  can  enter 
into  the  misgivings  and  fears  of  those  who  felt 


ANTERIORITY    OF    VEDANTA    OR    SAMKHYA.         30! 

startled  by  the  unflinching  Monism  of  the  Vedanta, 
at  least  as  interpreted  by  the  school  which  was 
represented  rather  than  founded  by  $amkara. 
Now,  the  two  points  which  are  most  likely  to 
have  caused  difficulty  or  given  offence  to  ordinary 
consciences,  would  seem  to  have  been  the  total 
denial  of  what  is  meant  by  the  reality  of  the 
objective  world,  and  the  required  surrender  of  all 
individuality  on  the  part  of  the  subject,  that  is, 
of  ourselves.  These  are  the  points  which  seem  most 
startling  even  to  ourselves,  and  it  is  quite  possible 
that  they  may  have  given  rise  to  another  system 
free  from  these  startling  doctrines,  such  as  we  find 
in  the  Samkhya.  They  certainly  formed  the  chief 
stumbling-block  to  Ramanm/a  and  those  who  had 
come  before  him,  such  as  Bodhayana  and  other 
Purv4Mryas,  and  led  them  to  propound  their  own 
more  human  interpretation  of  the  Vedanta,  though 
sacrificing  the  Isvara  in  order  to  save  the  reality 
of  each  Purusha. 

These  conflicting  views  of  the  world,  of  the  soul, 
and  of  God,  emerge  already  in  the  Upanishads ;  and 
in  a  few  of  them,  the  $vetasvatara,  Maitray,  and 
Ksithsi  Upanishads,  for  instance,  there  are  utterances 
that  come  very  near  to  what  we  know  as  Samkhya 
rather  than  Vedanta  doctrines.  Vedanta  ideas 
preponderate,  however,  so  decidedly  in  the  Upani- 
shad  literature,  that  we  can  well  understand  that 
in  the  oral  tradition  of  the  schools  the  Samkhya 
doctrines  should  have  exercised  a  limited  influence 
only,  whatever  favour  they  may  have  found  with 
those  who  were  repelled  by  the  extreme  views  of 
the  monistic  Vedanta.  The  followers  of  Kapila 
had  an  advantage  over  the  Vedantists  in  admitting 


302  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

a  Prakriti,  or  a  something  objective,  independent 
of  Brahman  or  Purusha,  though  called  into  life 
and  activity  by  the  look  of  Purusha  only,  and  dis- 
appearing when  that  look  ceased.  They  were  also 
less  opposed  to  the  common  consciousness  of  man- 
kind in  admitting  the  reality  of  individual  souls. 
Dualism  is  always  more  popular  than  rigorous 
Monism,  and  the  Sa??ikhya  was  clearly  dualistic 
when  it  postulated  nature,  not  only  as  the  result 
of  Avidya  or  Maya,  but  as  something  real  in  the 
ordinary  sense  of  that  word,  and  when  it  allowed 
to  the  individual  souls  or  (rivas  also  an  independent 
character.  It  should  be  remembered  that  the  denial 
of  an  Isvara  or  personal  Lord  did  not  probably 
form  part  of  the  original  Samkhya,  as  presented  to 
us  in  the  Tattva-samasa.  It  would  seem  therefore 
that  on  these  very  important  points  the  Samkhya 
was  more  conciliatory  and  less  defiant  to  the  common 
sense  of  mankind  than  the  Vedanta,  and  though 
this  is  far  from  proving  that  it  was  therefore 
posterior  to  the  Vedanta  in  its  severest  form,  it 
might  well  be  accepted  as  an  indication  that  these 
two  streams  of  thought  followed  parallel  courses, 
starting  from  a  common  fund  of  ancient  Vedic 
thoughts,  but  diverging  afterwards,  the  Vedanta  un- 
flinchingly following  its  straight  course,  the  other, 
the  Sa/ttikhya,  avoiding  certain  whirlpools  of  thought 
which  seemed  dangerous  to  the  ordinary  swimmer. 
To  the  people  at  large  it  would  naturally  seem  as 
if  the  Vedanta  taught  the  oneness  of  all  individual 
souls  or  subjects  in  Brahman,  and  the  illusory 
character  of  all  that  is  objective,  while  the  Sawkhya 
allowed  at  all  events  the  temporary  reality  of  the 
objective  world  and  the  multiplicity  of  individual 


ATHEISM    AND    ORTHODOXY.  303 

souls.  Of  course,  we  must  leave  it  an  open  question 
for  the  present  whether  the  extreme  monistic  view 
of  the  Veda  was  due  to  $amkara,  or  whether,  like 
Hamanu^a,  he  also  could  claim  the  authority  of 
PurvaMryas  in  his  interpretation  of  Badarayana's 
Sutras.  If  that  were  so,  the  difference  between 
the  two  systems  would  certainly  seem  to  be  irre- 
concilable, while  minor  differences  between  them 
would  in  India  at  least  admit  of  a  friendly  adjust- 
ment. 

Atheism  and  Orthodoxy. 

Even  on  what  seems  to'  us  so  vital  a  point  in  every 
philosophy  as  theism  or  atheism,  Indian  philosophers 
seem  to  have  been  able  to  come  to  an  understanding 
and  a  compromise.  We  must  remember  that  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Brahmans  the  Samkhya  is  atheistic  and 
yet  orthodox.  This  seems  to  us-  impossible  ;  but  the 
fact  is  that  orthodoxy  has  a  very  different  meaning 
in  India  from  what  it  has  with  us.  What  we  mean 
by  orthodoxy  was  with  them  not  much  more  than 
a  recognition  of  the  supreme  authority  of  the  Veda. 
The  Samkhya,  whatever  we  may  think  of  its  Yedic 
character,  never  denies  the  authority  of  the  Veda  in 
so  many  words,  though  it  may  express  a  less  decided 
submission  to  it.  Whether  in  its  origin  the  Samkhya 
was  quite  independent  of  the  Veda,  is  difficult  to 
say.  Some  scholars  think  that  the  recognition  of 
the  supreme  authority  of  the  $ruti  was  an  after- 
thought with  Kapila,  a  mere  stroke  of  theological 
diplomacy.  But  if  so,  we  should  be  forced  to  admit 
that  the  Samkhya  philosophers  wished,  by  means  of 
this  diplomacy,  to  be  raised  to  the  same  position 
which  others,  such  as  the  Vedaiitists,  had  occupied 
before  them ;  and  so  far  it  might  seem  to  indicate 


304  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  posteriority  of  the  Samkhya,  as  a  system  of 
philosophy. 

It  is  important  here  to  remember  that  the  Saw- 
khya  not  only  declared  for  the  authority  of  the  Veda, 
but  had  never  openly  rejected  it,  like  Bnhaspati  or 
Buddha.  It  is  quite  another  question  whether  it 
really  carried  out  the  spirit  of  the  Veda,  particularly 
of  the  Upanishads.  That  *Sa??ikara,  the  great  de- 
fender of  Vedantism,  should  deny  the  correctness  of 
the  interpretation  of  the  Veda,  adopted  by  Kapila, 
proves  after  all  no  more  than  that  a  difference  of 
opinion  existed  between  the  two,  but  it  would  show 
at  the  same  time  that  Kapila,  as  well  as  $awkara, 
had  tried  to  represent  his  philosophy  as  supported 
by  passages  from  the  Veda.  To  judge  from  a  passage 
in  the  beginning  of  the  Samkhya-karikas  it  might 
seem  indeed  that  Kapila  placed  his  own  philosophy 
above  the  Veda.  But  he  really  says  no  more  there 
than  that  certain  remedies  for  the  removal  of  pain, 
enjoined  by  the  Veda,  are  good,  and  that  other 
remedies  enjoined  by  philosophy  are  likewise  good  ; 
but  that  of  the  two  the  latter  are  better,  that  is, 
more  efficacious  (Tattva  Kaumudi,  v.  2).  This  does 
not  affect  the  authority  of  the  Veda  as  a  whole,  as 
compared  with  philosophy  or  human  knowledge. 
We  must  not  forget  that  after  all  it  is  >Sruti  or 

O 

revelation  itself  which  declares  that  all  remedies  are 
palliative  only,  and  that  real  freedom  (Moksha) 
from  all  suffering  can  be  derived  from  philosophical 
knowledge  only,  and  that  this  is  incomparably  higher 
than  sacrifices  or  other  meritorious  acts  (Sawkhya- 
prava£ana  I,  5). 


AUTHORITY    OP    THE    VEDA.  305 

Authority  of  the  Veda. 

What  authority  Kapila  assigns  to  the  Veda  may 
be  gathered  from  what  he  says  about  the  three 
possible  sources  of  knowledge,  perception,  inference, 
and  Aptava&ana,  that  is  the  received,  correct,  or  true 
word,  or,  it  may  be,  the  word  of  a  trustworthy 
person.  He  explains  Aptava&ana  in  v.  5  by  Apta- 
sruti,  which  clearly  means  received  revelation  or 
revelation  from  a  trustworthy  source.  However 
the  commentators  may  differ,  $ruti  can  here  mean 
the  Veda  only,  though,  no  doubt,  the  Veda  as 
interpreted  by  Kapila.  And  that  the  Veda  is  not 
only  considered  as  equal  to  sensuous  perception 
and  inference,  but  is  placed  by  him  on  an  even 
higher  pedestal,  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  Kapila 
(Sutras  V,  51)  declares  it  to  be  self-evident,  Svata^- 
pramawam,  while  perception  and  inference  are  not, 
but  are  admitted  to  be  liable  to  error  and  to  require 
confirmation. 

Though  it  is  true,  therefore,  that  with  the  true 
Samkhya  philosopher  the  Veda  does  not  possess 
that  superhuman  authority  which  is  ascribed  to  it 
by  Badarayana,  I  cannot  bring  myself  to  believe 
that  this  concession  on  the  part  of  Kapila  was 
a  mere  artifice  to  escape  the  fate  which,  for  in- 
stance, befell  Buddha.  There  are  many  passages 
where  Kapila  appeals  quite  naturally  to  $ruti  or 
revelation.  In  I,  36  he  appeals  to  both  Sicuti  and 
Nyaya,  reasoning,  but  in  many  places  he  appeals  to 
$ruti/ alone.  That  revelation  is  to  be  looked  upon 
as  superior  to  experience  or  sensuous  perception  is 
stated  by  him  in  so  many  words  in  I,  147,  where 
we  read  '  There  is  no  denial  of  what  is  established 

x 


306  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

by  $ruti.'  Again,  when  the  Nyaya  philosophy 
tries  to  establish  by  reasoning  that  the  organs  of 
sense  are  formed  of  the  elements,  Kapila  squashes 
the  whole  argument  by  a  simple  appeal  to  $ruti. 
'  They  cannot  be  so  formed,'  he  says,  '  because 
$ruti  says  that  they  are  formed  of  Ahamkara, 
self-consciousness  (II,  20)  V 

Other  passages  where  the  authority  of  /Sruti  is 
invoked  as  paramount  by  Kapila,  or  supposed  to  be 
so  by  the  commentator,  may  be  found  in  Samkhya- 
Sutras  I,  36;  77;  83;  147;  154;  II,  20;  22;  III, 
15;  80;  IV,  22;  &c. 

Sflwkhya  hostile  to  Priesthood. 

There  is  one  passage  only  in  which  a  decidedly 
hostile  feeling  towards  the  Brahmanic  priesthood 
may  be  discovered  in  Kapila's  Sutras,  and  it  seems 
full  of  meaning.  Among  the  different  kinds  of 
bondage  to  which  men  are  liable,  but  ought  not  to 
be,  is  one  called  Dakshma-bandha,  bondage  arising 
from  having  to  offer  gifts  to  priests,  which  seems  to 
be  condemned  as  superstitious  and  mischievous  2. 

As  springing  from  the  great  mass  of  philosophic 
thought  accumulated  in  the  Upanishads,  the  Sa??i- 
khya,  like  the  Vedanta-philosophy,  was  probably  at 
first  considered  as  neither  orthodox  nor  unorthodox. 
It  was  simply  one  out  of  many  attempts  to  solve 
the  riddle  of  the  world,  and  even  the  fact  that  it 
did  not  appeal  to  a  personal  Lord  or  creator,  was 
evidently  at  first  riot  considered  sufficient  to  anathe- 
matise it  as  unorthodox  or  un-Vedic.  It  was  probably 

1  But  are  not  the  elements  mere  Vikaras  of  Ahawkani? 

2  See  Tattva-samiisa  22  ;  Sawjkliya-karikas  44. 


DEVELOPMENT    OF    PHILOSOPHICAL    SYSTEMS.        307 

at  a  much  later  time  when  the  Vedanta  and  other 
systems  had  already  entrenched  themselves  behind 
revelation,  or  the  Veda,  as  the  highest  authority 
even  on  philosophical  questions,  that  other  systems, 
having  been  proved  un-Vedic,  came  to  be  considered 
as  objectionable  or  unorthodox,  while  the  Vedanta, 
as  its  very  name  implied,  was  safe  under  the  shadow 
of  the  Veda.  I  know  that  other  scholars  maintain 
that  with  the  Samkhya  any  appeal  to  the  Veda  was 
an  afterthought  only,  and  not  an  essential  part  of  the 
original  system,  nay,  not  even  quite  honest.  We  may 
admit  that  the  Samkhya  has  no  need  of  the  Veda, 
but  why  should  it  appeal  to  it  even  on  indifferent 
questions,  if  the  Veda  had  not  been  considered  by  it 
as  of  supreme  authority.  It  is  possible  that  there 
may  have  been  originally  a  difference  between  $ruti, 
revelation  as  not  human,  and  Apta-va&ana,  authori- 
tative tradition  as  human,  and  that  with  Kapila  the 
Veda  was  treated  at  first  as  coming  under  Apta- 
va&ana.  But  however  this  may  be,  unless  our  con- 
ception of  the  development  of  Indian  philosophy,  as 
we  catch  glimpses  of  it  now  and  then  in  the  course 
of  centuries,  is  entirely  wrong,  it  must  be  clear  that, 
in  the  present  state  of  our  knowledge,  to  call  one 
channel  of  philosophic  thought,  whether  Samkhya 
or  Vedanta,  in  the  form  in  which  it  has  reached  us, 
more  ancient  than  the  other,  would  be  mere  playing 
with  words. 

Parallel  development  of  Philosophical  Systems. 

The  result  of  this  desire  to  fix  dates,  where  dates 
are  impossible,  has  often  proved  most  mischievous. 
Scholars  of  recognised  authority  have  arrived  at 
and  given  expression  to  convictions,  riot  only  widely 

X   2 


308  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

different,  but  diametrically  opposed  to  each  other. 
The  chief  cause  of  this  confusion  has  been  that,  by 
a  very  natural  tendency,  we  always  wish  to  arrange 
things  Nacheinander  or  in  causal  connection,  instead 
of  being  satisfied  with  taking  things  as  Nebenein- 
ander,  parallel  and  formed  under  similar  conditions, 
springing  from  a  common  source  and  flowing  on  side 
by  side  in  the  same  direction. 

A  reference  to  the  history  of  language  may  make 
my  meaning  clearer.  No  one  would  say  that  Greek 
was  older  than  Latini  Greek  has  some  forms  more 
primitive  than  Latin,  but  Latin  also  has  some  forms 
more  primitive  than  Greek.  It  is  true  that  we 
know  literary  productions  in  Greek  at  a  much 
earlier  time  than  literary  productions  in  Latin, 
nor  would  any  Sanskrit  scholar  deny  that  the 
Sutras  of  Badarayana  are  older  than  the  Sa?nkhya- 
Sutras,  as  we  now  possess  the  two.  But  for  all 
that,  Greek,  as  a  language,  cannot  be  a  day  older 
than  Latin.  Both  branched  off,  slowly  it  may  be 
and  almost  imperceptibly  at  first,  from  the  time 
when  the  Aryan  separation  took  place.  In  their 
embryonic  form  they  both  go  back  to  some  indefinite 
date,  far  beyond  the  limits  of  any  chronology.  In 
India  we  may  learn  how,  like  language,  religion, 
and  mythology,  philosophy  also  formed  at  first 
a  kind  of  common  property.  We  meet  with 
philosophical  ideas  of  a  Vedantic  character,  though 
as  yet  in  a  very  undecided  form,  as  far  back  as  the 
hymns  of  the  Ilig-veda ;  they  meet  us  again  in 
the  Brahmawas  and  in  some  of  the  Upanishads, 
while  the  Samkhya  ideas  stand  out  less  prominently, 
owing,  it  would  seem,  to  the  ascendency  gained  at 
that  early  period  already  by  the  Vedanta.  Instead 


BUDDHISM    SUBSEQUENT    TO    UPANISHADS.          309 

of  supposing,  however,  that  passages  in  support  of 
Sa/n-khya  ideas  occurring  in  certain  of  the  older 
Upanishads  were  foisted  in  at  a  later  time,  it  seems 
far  more  probable  to  me  that  they  were  survivals 
of  an  earlier  period  of  as  yet  undifferentiated  philo- 
sophical thought. 

Buddhism  subsequent  to  Upanishads. 

What  remains  of  the  chronological  framework 
of  Indian  philosophy  is  in  the  end  not  much  more 
than  that  both  Vedanta  and  S&mkhya  ideas  existed 
before  the  rise  of  historical  Buddhism.  The  very 
name  of  Upanishad,  for  instance,  is  so  peculiar  that 
its  occurrence  in  ancient  Buddhist  texts  proves  once 
for  all  the  existence  of  some  of  these  works  before 
the  rise  of  Buddhism. 

The  recognition  of  mendicant  friars  also,  as 
a  social  institution,  seems  to  me  simply  taken  over 
from  the  Brahmans.  The  very  name  of  Bhikkhu, 
applied  to  the  members  of  the  Buddhist  fraternity, 
comes  from  the  same  source.  It  is  true,  no  doubt, 
that  the  name  of  Bhikshu  does  not  occur  in  the 
classical  Upanishads,  but  the  right  of  begging, 
whether  in  the  first  or  the  third  of  the  Asramas 
(BrahmaMrin  or  Vanaprastha),  is  fully  recognised, 
only  that  the  third  and  fourth  Asramas  are  not 
so  clearly  distinguished  in  early  times  as  they  are 
in  Manu  and  afterwards.  In  the  Kaush.  Up. 
II,  2  we  read  of  a  man  who  has  begged  through 
a  village  and  got  nothing  (Bhikshitva) ;  in  the 
JTMnd.  Up.  IV,  3,  5,  a  BrahmaA-arin  is  mentioned 
who  has  begged.  The  technical  term  for  this 
begging  is  BhikshaMry£  in  the  B-rih.  Ar.  Up.  Ill 
(V),  5,  i,  and  exactly  the  same  compound,  Bhikkha- 


310  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Mrya,  occurs  in  the  Dhammapada  392  ;  Bhaiksha- 
Hry£  occurs  also  in  the  Mwic/aka  I,  2,  n,  so  that 
the  fact  that  the  substantive  Bhikshu  does  not 
occur  in  the  classical  Upanishads  can  hardly  be 
used  as  an  argument  to  prove  that  the  status  of 
the  mendicant  friar  was  not  known  before  the  spread- 
ing of  Buddhism.  It  is  true  that  in  its  social  mean- 
ing Asrama,  the  name  of  the  three  or  four  stages, 
does  not  occur  in  the  classical  Upanishads ;  but, 
as  we  find  Asramin  in  the  Maitray.  Up.  IV,  3,  we 
can  hardly  doubt  that  the  three  or  four  stages 
(Brahma&ari,  Gaha^Ao,  Vanapa^Ao,  Bhikkhu)  were 
known  before  the  rise  of  Buddhism,  and  taken 
over  by  the  Buddhists  from  the  Vedic  Brahmans. 
Socially,  the  only  Asramas  that  remained  among 
the  Buddhists  were  two,  that  of  the  Grihins  and 
that  of  the  Bhikkhus. 

That  many  of  the  technical  terms  of  the  Buddhists 
(Uposhadha,  &c.)  could  have  come  from  the  same 
source  only,  has  long  been  known,  so  much  so  that 
it  has  been  rightly  said,  Without  Brahmanism  no 
Buddhism. 

The  institution  of  the  Vasso l,  for  instance,  the 
retreat  during  the  rainy  season,  is  clearly  taken  over 
from  the  Varshas,  the  rainy  season,  as  kept  by  the 
Brahmans,  and  so  is  the  quinquennial  celebration 
of  the  Pan&avarsha-parishad,  and  many  other  cus- 
toms adopted  by  the  Buddhists. 

Lalita-vistara. 

I  have  explained  before  why  at  present  I  attribute 
less  importance  than  I  did  formerly  to  the  occurrence 

1  S.  13.  E.  VIII,  p.  213. 


ASVAGHOSHAS    BUDDHA- JTARITA.  31! 

of  a  number  of  titles,  including  Samkhya,  Yoga, 
Vaiseshika,  and  possibly  Nyaya,  in  the  Lalita- 
vistara.  If  the  date  assigned  by  Stanislas  Julien 
and  others  to  certain  Chinese  translations  of  this 
work  could  be  re-established,  the  passage  so  often 
quoted  from  the  twelfth  chapter  would  be  of  con- 
siderable value  to  us  in  forming  an  idea  of  Indian 
literature  as  it  existed  at  the  time  when  the 
Lalita-vistara  was  originally  composed.  We  find 
here  the  names  not  only  of  the  Vedic  glossary 
(Nigha^u  ?)  the  Nigamas  (part  of  Nirukta),  Puranas, 
Itihasas,  Vedas,  grammar,  Nirukta,  /Siksha,  Khan- 
das,  ritual  (Kalpa),  astronomy  (6ryotisha),  but, 
what  would  be  most  important  for  us,  the  names  of 
three  systems  of  philosophy  also,  Samkhya,  Yoga, 
and  Vaiseshika,  while  Hetuvidya  can  hardly  be 
meant  for  anything  but  Nyaya.  But  until  the  dates 
of  the  various  Chinese  translations  of  the  Life  of 
Buddha  have  been  re-examined,  we  must  abstain 
from  using  them  for  assigning  any  dates  to  their 
Sanskrit  originals. 

Asvaghosha's  Buddha-&arita. 

We  may  perhaps  place  more  reliance  on  Asva- 
ghosha's Buddha-A-arita,  which,  with  great  probability, 
has  been  ascribed  to  the  first  century  A.D.  He  men- 
tions Vyasa,  the  son  of  Sarasvati,  as  the  compiler 
of  the  Veda,  though  not  of  the  Vedanta-Sutras  ;  he 
knows  Valmiki,  the  author  of  the  Ramayana,  Atreya 
as  a  teacher  of  medicine,  and  kanaka,  the  well- 
known  king,  as  a  teacher  of  Yoga.  By  far  the 
most  important  passage  in  it  for  our  present 
purpose  is  the  conversation  between  Arac/a  and 
the  future  Buddha,  here  already  called  Bodhisattva 


312  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

in  the  twelfth  book.  This  Arac/a  is  clearly  a  teacher 
of  Samkhya-philosophy,  it  may  be  of  Sa??ikhya  in  an 
earlier  state  ;  and,  though  the  name  of  Samkhya  does 
not  occur,  the  name  of  Kapila  does  (XII,  2 1 ),  and 
even  a  disciple  of  his  is  mentioned.  Here  then  we 
have  in  a  poem,  ascribed  to  the  first  century  A.  D., 
a  clear  reference  to  that  philosophical  system  which 
is  known  to  us  under  the  name  of  Samkhya,  and  we 
have  actually  the  name  of  Kapila,  the  reputed 
author  of  that  system.  The  name  of  Kapila- vastu l 
also  occurs,  as  the  birthplace  of  Buddha  and  as  the 
dwelling  of  the  famous  sage  Kapila.  No  reference 
to  the  Vedanta  has  been  met  with  in  Asvaghosha's 
Buddha-£arita,  though  the  substitution  of  the  Ve- 
dantic  name  of  Brahman  for  the  Sawkhya  name 
of  Purusha  deserves  attention. 

Buddhist  Suttas. 

If  we  consult  the  Buddhist  Suttas,  which,  what- 
ever the  date  of  their  original  composition  may  have 
been,  were  at  all  events  reduced  to  writing  in  the 
first  century  B.C.,  and  may  be  safely  used  therefore  as 
historical  evidence  for  that  time,  we  find  there  also 
views  ascribed  to  the  Brahmans  of  Buddha's  time 
which  clearly  breathe  the  spirit  of  the  Sa??ikhya- 
philosophy.  But  it  would  be  very  unsafe  to  say 
more,  and  to  maintain  that  such  passages  prove  in 
any  way  the  existence  of  fully  developed  systems  of 
philosophy,  or  of  anything  very  different  from  what 
we  find  already  in  certain  Upanishads.  All  we  can 

1  I  write  Vastu,  because  that  alone  means  dwelling-place, 
while  Vastu  means  thing.  Vastu  became  Vattliu  in  Pali,  and 
was  then  probably  retranslated  into  Sanskrit  as  Vastu. 


ASVALAYANA'S  GS/HYA-S^TEAS.  313 

say  is  that  there  are  a  number  of  terms  in  the 
Suttas  which  are  the  very  terms  used  in  the  Vedanta, 
Samkhya  and  Yoga-philosophies,  such  as  Atman, 
/Sa-svata,  Nitya  (?  Anitya),  Akshobhya,  Brahman, 
tsvara,  Dharma,  Parmama,  and  many  more  ;  but,  so 
far  as  I  know,  there  is  not  one  of  which  we  could 
say  that  it  could  have  been  taken  from  the  Sutras 
only,  and  from  nowhere  else. 

We  should  remember  that  in  the  Buddhist  Canon 
we  find  constant  mention  of  Titthiyas  or  Tirthakas 
and  their  heretical  systems  of  philosophy.  Six  con- 
temporaries of  Buddha  are  mentioned,  one  of  them, 
Nigan^o  Nataputta,  being  the  well-known  founder 
of  (jrainism,  Purana  Kassapa,  Makkhali,  Agita, 
Pakudha  and  Sa^k/aya1.  Nor  are  the  names  of 
the  reputed  authors  of  the  six  systems  of  Brahmanic- 
philosophy  absent  from  the  Tripi^aka.  But  we  hear 
nothing  of  any  literary  compositions  ascribed  to 
B4daraya?ia,  (raimini,  Kapila,  Pataf^/ali,  Gotama 
or  Kanada.  Some  of  these  names  occur  in  the 
Buddhist  Sanskrit  texts  also,  such  as  the  Lanka- 
vatara  where  the  names  of  Kanada,  Kapila,  Aksha- 
pada,  Brthaspati  are  met  with,  but  again  not  a 
single  specimen  or  extract  from  their  compositions. 

Asvalayana's  Gnhya-Stltras. 

Another  help  for  determining  the  existence  of 
ancient  Sutras  and  Bhashyas  may  be  found  in  the 
GHhya-Sutras  of  Asvalayana  and  /S'amkhayana,  works 
belonging  to  the  age  of  Vedic  literature,  though  it 
may  be  to  the  very  end  of  what  I  call  the  Sutra- 
period.  Here,  as  I  pointed  out  in  1859  in  my  History 

1  Samar5f?a-Phala-Sutta  3. 


314  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  Ancient  Sanskrit  Literature,  we  find  not  only 
the  Rig-veda  with  all  its  subdivisions,  but  such 
names  as  Sumantu,  (raimini,  Vaisampayana,  Paila, 
Sutras,  Bhashyas,  Bharata1,  Mahabharata,  teachers 
of  the  law,  (ninanti,  Bahavi,  Gargya,  Gautama, 
^Sakalya,  Babhravya,  Mancfavya,  Manc/ukeya,  Gargi 
Va&aknavi,  Vadav&  Pratitheyi,  Sulabh4  Maitreyi, 
Kahola  Kaushitaka,  Mahakaushitaka,  Paimgya, 
Mahapai?«gya,  Suyagwa  $a??ikhayana,  Aitareya, 
Mahaitareya,  the  Sakala  (text),  the  Bashkala  (text), 
Su^atavaktra,  Audavahi,  Mahaudavahi,  Sau^ami, 
/Saunaka,  Asvalayana.  The  ^S^ikhayana  G?^'hya- 
Siitras  IV,  10,  give  the  same  list,  though  leaving 
out  a  few  names  and  adding  others.  The  most 
valuable  part  in  both  sets  of  Grihya-Sutras  is  their 
testifying  at  that  early  and  probably  pre-Buddhistic 
time,  not  only  to  the  existence  of  Sutras,  but  of 
Bhashyas  or  commentaries  also,  without  which,  as 
I  said  before,  neither  the  philosophical,  nor  the 
grammatical,  nor  any  other  Sutras  would  ever  have 
been  intelligible,  or  even  possible. 

Did  Buddha  borrow  from  Kapila  ? 

I  may  seem  very  sceptical  in  all  this,  but  I  cannot 
even  now  bring  myself  to  believe  that  the  author  of 
Buddhism  borrowed  from  the  Samkhya  or  any  other 
definite  system  of  philosophy,  as  known  to  us  in  its 
final  Sutra  form,  in  the  sense  which  we  ourselves  assign 
to  borrowing.  Buddha,  it  seems  to  me,  had  as  much 


1  How  careful  we  must  be,  we  may  learn  from  the  fact 
that  instead  of  Bharata  and  Mahabharata,  other  MSS.  read 
Bharatadharma/raryas  ;  while  in  the  Samkhayana  Gn'hya-Sutras 
IV,  10,  4,  Bharata,  Mahabharata  and  Dharmaftaryas  are  left 
out  altogether. 


DID    BUDDHA    BORROW    FROM    KAPILA  ?  315 

right  to  many  of  the  so-called  Sa?>ikhya  or  Yedanta 
ideas  as  Kapila  or  anybody  else.  Who  would  say, 
for  instance,  that  his  belief  in  Samsara  or  migration 
of  souls  was  borrowed  from  Badarayawa  or  Kapila  ? 
It  belonged  to  everybody  in  India  as  much  as 
a  belief  in  Karman  or  the  continuous  working  of 
deeds.  In  the  great  dearth  of  historical  dates  it 
may  no  doubt  be  excusable,  if  we  lay  hold  of  any- 
thing to  save  us  from  drowning  while  exploring  the 
chronology  of  Indian  literature.  Our  difficulties  are 
very  great,  for  .even  when  the  names  of  the  principal 
systems  of  philosophy  and  the  names  of  their  reputed 
authors  are  mentioned,  how  do  we  know  that  they 
refer  to  anything  written  that  we  possess  ?  Unless 
we  meet  with  verbatim  quotations,  we  can  never 
know  whether  a  certain  book  of  a  certain  author  is 
intended,  or  simply  the  general  Parampara,  that 
is,  the  tradition,  as  handed  down  in  various  Asramas, 
two  things  which  should  be  carefully  distinguished. 
It  is  strange  to  see  how  often  our  hopes  have 
been  roused  and  disappointed.  We  were  told  that 
in  Professor  Hardy's  most  valuable  translation  of 
the  Anguttara  a  number  of  philosophical  sects  were 
mentioned  which  existed  at  the  time  of  Buddha's 
appearance,  such  as  (i)  Agdvakos,  (2)  Nigan^Aos, 
(3)  Muw<iasavakos,  (4)  6ratilakos,  (5)  Paribba^akos, 
(6)  Magandikos,  (7)  Tedancfrkos,  (8)  Aviruddhakos, 
(9)  Gotamakos,  and  (10)  Devadhammikos.  But  not 
one  of  these  names  helps  us  to  a  real  chronological 
date.  Agdvakos  and  Nig&nthos  are  the  names  of 
(7aina  ascetics,  the  latter  belonging  to  the  Digambara 
sects,  which  could  hardly  have  been  established  long 
before  Buddha's  appearance,  while  Munc/asavakos, 
i.e.  pupils  of  the  shaveling,  the  Buddha,  and  Gota- 


316  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

makos  would  seem  to  be  schools  which  owed  their 
existence  to  Buddha  himself.  The  other  names 
(ratilakos,  ascetics,  Paribba^rakos,  religious  mendi- 
cants, Teda>ic/ikos,  i.e.  Sawmyasins  carrying  the  three 
staves,  would  be  applicable  both  to  Brahmanic  and 
Buddhist  sects.  Magandikos,  if  meant  for  Maga- 
dhikos,  people  of  Magadha,  would  be  Buddhists 
again.  Aviruddhakos,  a  name  not  clear  to  me,  may 
have  been  intended  for  ascetics  no  longer  impeded 
by  any  desires,  while  Devadhammikos  are  clearly 
worshippers  of  the  ancient  national  Devas,  and 
therefore  Brahmanic,  and  possibly  Vedic.  We  get 
no  historical  dates  from  the  names  of  any  of  these 
schools,  if  schools  they  were.  All  they  teach  is  that 
at  the  time  Brahmanic  and  Buddhist  sects  were 
existing  side  by  side  in  large  numbers,  but  by  no 
means,  as  is  commonly  supposed,  in  constant  con- 
flict with  each  other1.  Of  the  six  recognised  systems 
of  philosophy,  of  their  eponymous  heroes  or  their 
written  works,  we  do  not  hear  a  single  word. 

Buna's  Harshafcarita. 

Not  even  in  later  works,  which  have  been  referred 
to  the  sixth,  seventh,  and  eighth  centuries  A.D.,  do 
we  meet  with  actual  quotations  from  our  Sutras  of 
the  six  Darsanas.  Bana,  in  his  Life  of  King  Harslia, 
knows  indeed  of  Aupanishadas,  Kapilas,  Ka^adas ; 
and  if  the  Kapilas  are  the  followers  of  the  Sawkhya, 
Ka^adas  the  followers  of  the  Vaiseshika  school,  the 
Aupanishadas  can  hardly  be  meant  for  anybody 
but  the  Vedantins.  Varaha-Mihira  also,  in  the  sixth 


Cf.  Ehys  Davids,  J.  K.  A.  S.,  Jan.,  1898,  p.  197. 


BANAS    HARSHAJTARITA.  317 

century  A.  D.,  mentions  Kapila  and  Kanabhu^ 
(Vaiseshika),  but  even  this  does  not  help  us  to  the 
dates  of  any  Sutras  composed  by  them. 

The  Chinese  translator  of  the  Karikas,  likewise  in 
the  sixth  century,  informs  us  that  these  Karikas 
contain  the  words  of  Kapila  or  of  Pan&asikha,  the 
pupil  of  Asuri,  who  was  the  pupil  of  Kapila.  We 
are  told  even  that  there  were  originally  60,000 
Gathas,  and  all  that  Is vara- Krishna  did  was  to 
select  seventy  of  them  for  his  seventy  or  seventy- 
two  Karikas. 

That  MMhava  (1350  A.  D.),  while  mentioning  the 
Sutras  of  the  other  systems,  should  not  have  men- 
tioned those  of  the  Samkhya,  is  no  doubt,  as  I 
pointed  out  before,  a  strong  argument  in  support 
of  their  non-existence  in  his  time.  But  it  is  no 
proof,  as  little  as  we  may  conclude  from  the  fact 
that  Hiouen-thsang  translated  the  Vaiseshika-nikaya- 
dasapadartha-sastra  by  6rrtana&andra,  and  not  the 
Vaiseshika-Sutras  by  Kanada,  that  therefore  these 
Sutras  did  not  exist  in  his  time.  We  cannot  be  too 
careful  in  such  matters,  for  the  unreserved  accept- 
ance of  a  purely  conjectural  date  is  very  apt  to  inter- 
fere with  the  discovery  of  a  real  date.  Hiouen-thsang 
likewise  mentions  a  number  of  Nyaya  works,  but 
not  Gotama's  Nyaya-Sutras.  Does  that  prove  that 
Gotama's  Sutras  were  unknown  in  the  seventh 
century  1  It  may  or  may  not.  He  relates  that 
Gimamati  defeated  a  famous  Samkhya  philosopher 
of  the  name  of  Madhava,  but  again  he  tells  us  no 
more.  His  own  special  study,  as  is  well  known, 
was  the  Yoga-philosophy.  And  here  again,  though 
he  speaks  of  a  number  of  Yoga  works,  he  says 
not  a  word  of  the  most  important  of  them  all,  the 


318  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Sfttras  of  Pata/i^ali J.  Yet  I  doubt  whether  we 
may  conclude  from  this  that  these  Sutras  did  not 
exist  at  his  time. 


The  Tattva-samasa. 

If  then  I  venture  to  call  the  Tattva-samasa  the 
oldest  record  that  has  reached  us  of  the  Samkhya- 
philosophy,  and  if  I  prefer  to  follow  them  in  the  ac- 
count I  give  of  that  philosophy,  I  am  quite  aware 
that  many  scholars  will  object,  and  will  prefer  the 
description  of  the  Samkhya  as  given  in  the  Karikas 
and  in  the  Sutras.  Both  of  them,  particularly  the 
Karikas,  give  us  certainly  better  arranged  accounts 
of  that  philosophy,  as  may  be  seen  in  the  excellent 
editions  and  translations  which  we  owe  to  Professor 
Garbe,  and  I  may  now  add  to  Satish  Chandra 
Banerji,  1898.  If,  as  I  believe,  the  Tattva-samasa- 
Sutras  are  older  than  our  Samkhya-Sutras,  their 
account  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy  would  always 
possess  its  peculiar  interest  from  a  historical  point 
of  view  ;  while  even  if  their  priority  with  regard  to 
the  Karikas  and  Sutras  be  doubted,  they  would 
always  retain  their  value  as  showing  us  in  how 
great  a  variety  the  systems  of  philosophy  really 
existed  in  so  large  a  country  as  India. 

These  Samasa-Sutras,  it  is  true,  are  hardly  more 
than  a  table  of  contents,  a  mere  S4mkhyam  or  Pari- 
samkhya,  but  that  would  only  show  once  more  that 
they  presuppose  the  existence  of  a  commentary  from 
the  very  first.  What  we  possess  in  the  shape  of  com- 
mentaries may  not  be  very  old,  for  commentaries 
may  come  and  go  in  different  schools,  while  the 

1  M.  M.,  India,  p.  362. 


THE    TATTVA-SAMASA.  319 

Sutras  which  they  intend  to  explain,  would  remain 
unchanged,  engraved  on  the  memory  of  teachers 
and  pupils.  How  tenacious  that  philosophical 
ParampaKi  was  we  can  see  from  the  pregnant  fact 
that  the  Akhyayikas  or  stories,  though  left  out  in. 
the  Karikas,  must  surely  have  existed  both  before 
and  after  the  time  of  Isvara-Kn'srma,  for  though 
absent  in  the  Tattva-samasa  and  in  the  Karikas, 
they  reappear  in  our  Samkhya-Sutras.  Where  were 
they  during  the  interval  if  not  in  Sutras  or  Karikas, 
now  lost  to  us  ? 

The  commentary  on  the  Tattva-samasa,  the  pub- 
lication of  which  we  owe  to  Ballantyne,  begins  witli 
an  introduction  which  sounds,  no  doubt,  like  a  late 
tradition,  but  reminds  us  in  some  respects  of  the 
dialogue  at  the  beginning  of  the  Chinese  translation 
of  the  commentary  on  the  Samkhya-karikas.  But 
though  it  may  sound  like  a  late  tradition,  it  would 
be  very  difficult  to  prove  that  it  was  so.  Chronology 
is  not  a  matter  of  taste  that  can  be  settled  by  mere 
impressions. 

A  certain  Brahman,  we  are  told,  overcome  by  the 
three  kinds  of  pain,  took  refuge  with  the  great 
Tfo'shi  Kapila,  the  teacher  (not  necessarily  the  origi- 
nator) of  the  Samkhya l,  and  having  declared  his 
family,  his  name,  and  his  clan  in  order  to  become 
his  pupil,  he  said  :  '  Reverend  Sir,  What  is  here  on 
earth  the  highest  (the  summum  bonum)  ?  What  is 
truth  ?  What  must  I  do  to  be  saved  ? ' 

Kapila  said,  'I  shall  tell  thee.'  Then  follow  the 
topics  which  are  twenty-five  in  number  :— 


1  In  the  Bhagavata-purawa  I,  3,  u,  Kapila  is  said  to  have 
revived  the  Sawkhya  (Sawikhya-Sara,  ed.  Hall,  p.  7,  note). 


320  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 


List  of  Twenty-five  Tattvas. 

I.  The  eight  Prakritis  (primary  and  produc- 
tive elements), 

1.  The  Prakriti  as  Avyakta  (the  non-dif- 

ferentiated or  undeveloped  principle) ; 

2.  The  Buddhi  (intellect),  of  eight  kinds  ; 

3.  The  Aha?nkara  (the  subject),  of  three 

kinds  (Vaikarika,  Tai^asa,  Bhutadi)  ; 
4-8.  The  five  Tanmatras  (essences)  of  sound, 
touch,  colour,  savour,  and  odour. 

II.  The  sixteen  ViMras  (modifications),  / 
9-13.  The  five  Buddhindriyas  (perceptive 

organs)  ; 

14-18.  The  five  Karmendriyas  (active 
organs) ; 

19.  Manas  (central  organ  or  mind) ; 

20-24.  The  Mahabhutas  (material  ele- 
ments) ; 

III.  25.  The  Purusha  (Spirit  or  Self). 


•{ 


a 

0> 


IV.  The  Traigunya  (triad  of  forces). 

V.  The  Sahara  (evolution). 

VI.  The  PratisafJiara  (dissolution). 

i  referring  to  the  thirteen 

VII.  The  Adhyatma 

/  instruments,  i.e.  to  bud- 

VIII.  The  Adhibhtita  \      ,.  .     A1       ,' 

TV    rin      A  11-1  •  tlln,   Ahamkara,   Manas, 

IX.  Ihe  Adhiuaivata  ,  , ,  T    i  • 

•  v    and  the  ten  Indnyas. 

X.  The  five  Abhibuddhis  (apprehensions),  five  acts 
of  Buddhi  or  the  Indriyas. 

XT.  The  five  Karmayonis  (sources  of  activity). 

XII.  The  five  Vilyus,  winds  or  vital  spirits. 

XIII.  The  five  Karmatmans,  kinds  of  Ahamkara. 


THE    AVYAKTA.  321 

XIV.  Avidya  (Nescience),  fivefold,  with  sixty-two 
subdivisions. 

XV.  Asakti    (weakness),    twenty-eightfold    (nine 
Atushds  and  eight  Asiddhis). 

XVI.  Tushd  (contentment),  ninefold. 

XVII.  Siddhi  (perfection),  eightfold. 

XVIII.  Mulikarthas  (cardinal  facts),  eight. 

XIX.  Anugrahasarga  (benevolent  creation). 

XX.  Bhutasarga  (creation  of  material  elements), 
fourteen. 

XXI.  Bandha  (bondage),  threefold. 

XXII.  Moksha  (freedom),  threefold. 

XXIII.  Pramana  (authorities),  threefold. 

XXIV.  Du/ikha  (pain),  threefold. 

I  have  given  these  titles  or  headings  in  Sanskrit, 
and  shall  often  have  to  use  these  Sanskrit  terms, 
because  their  English  equivalents,  even  when  they 
can  be  found,  are  too  often  unintelligible  or  mis- 
leading without  a  commentary.  This  commentary 
which  follows  immediately  on  the  Sutra,  is  meant 
to  elucidate  their  meaning,  and  it  does  so  on  the 
whole  satisfactorily,  but  the  English  word  seems 
never  to  square  the  Sanskrit  terms  quite  accurately. 

The  commentator  begins  by  asking,  '  Now  what 
are  the  eight  PrakHtis  V  and  he  answers,  again 
in  technical  terms  which  will  have  to  be  explained  : 
I.  '  i.  The  Avyakta  (chaos),  2.  Buddhi  (light  or  per- 
ception), 3.  Ahamkara  (subjectivity),  and  4-8,  the 
five  Tanmatras  (transcendental  elements).' 

The  Avyakta. 

He  then  continues  :  i .  '  Here  then  the  Avyakta, 
neuter  (the  undeveloped),  is  explained.  As  in  the 


322  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

world  various  objects  such  as  water-jars,  cloth,  vases, 
beds,  &c.,  are  manifest,  not  so  is  the  Avyakta 
manifest.  It  is  not  apprehended  by  the  senses,  such 
as  the  ear,  &c.  And  why  ?  Because  it  has  neither 
beginning,  middle,  nor  end,  nor  has  it  any  parts. 
It  is  inaudible,  intangible,  invisible,  indestructible, 
eternal,  without  savour  and  odour.  The  learned 
declare  it  to  be  without  beginning  and  middle,  to 
be  beyond  what  is  great  *,  unchanging,  pre-eminent. 
And  again,  this  Avyakta  is  subtle,  without  attri- 
butes, without  beginning  or  end,  producing  (Prasuta), 
but  alone  of  all  the  eight  PrakHtis  unproduced 
(Aprasuta),  without  parts,  one  only,  but  common  to 
all.  And  these  are  its  synonyms,  that  is  to  say, 
words  applicable  to  the  Avyakta,  under  certain 
circumstances  :  Pradhana  (principal),  Brahman2,  Pura 
(abode),  Dhruva  (unchanging),  Pradhanaka  (chief), 
Akshara  (indestructible),  Kshetra  (field,  object), Tamas 
(darkness),  Prasuta  (productive).' 

Buddhi. 

2.  '  And  what  is  called  Buddhi  (intellect)  ?  Buddhi 
is  Adhyava'saya  (ascertainment).  It  is  that  through 
which  there  is  in  regard  to  a  cow,  &c.,  the  conviction 
(Pratipatti),  "  This  is  so  and  so,  not  otherwise,  this 
is  a  cow,  not  a  horse  ;  this  is  a  post,  not  a  man." 

1  Mahat  in  the  sense  of  mind,  and  Pradhana  in  the  sense  of 
nature,  seem  hardly  to  be  appropriate  here. 

2  Brahman  seems  out  of  place  here,  and  to  be  synonymous 
with  Purusha  or  Atman  rather  than  with  the   Avyakta.      It 
is   given  as  a  synonym  of  Purusha  further   on,    but   strictly 
speaking  Prakn'ti  also  would,  from  a  Vedantic  point  of  view, 
fall  to  Brahman  as  being  what  is  called  the  substantial  cause 
of  the  world,  but  of  an  immaterial  world,  as  it  would  seem. 


BUDDHI.  323 

Such  is  Buddhi,  the  most  wonderful  phase  of  Pra- 
kn'ti.' 

Buddhi  is  generally  taken  here  in  its  subjective  or 
psychological  sense,  but  whatever  native  and  Euro- 
pean authorities  may  have  to  say,  it  is  impossible  that 
this  should  have  been  its  original  meaning  in  the 
mind  of  Kapila.  If  Buddhi  meant  only  determi- 
nation (Adhyavasaya),  even  in  its  widest  sense,  it 
would  clearly  presuppose  the  later  phases,  not  only 
Ahamkara,  Manas,  Indriyas,  as  subjective,  but  like- 
wise something  that  is  knowable  and  determinable, 
such  as  Mahabhutas,  or  at  least  Tanmatras.  Though 
this  psychological  acceptation  is  the  common  accep- 
tation of  Buddhi  among  native  writers  on  Samkhya, 
yet  sense  is  more  important  than  commentaries. 
The  Buddhi  or  the  Mahat  must  here  be  a  phase 
in  the  cosmic  growth  of  the  universe,  like  Prakriti 
in  the  beginning,  and  the  senses  and  the  other  organs 
of  the  soul;  and  however  violent  our  proceeding  may 
seem,  we  can  hardly  help  taking  this  Great  Principle, 
the  Mahat,  in  a  cosmic  sense.  Now  the  first  step 
after  Avyakta,  the  undeveloped,  dull,  and  as  yet 
senseless  Prakriti,  can  only  be  PrakHti  as  lighted 
up,  as  rendered  capable  of  perception,  and  no  longer 
as  dull  matter.  If  taken  in  a  psychological  sense, 
it  supplies,  no  doubt,  in  a  later  stage,  the  possibility 
of  individual  perception  also,  or  of  the  determination 
of  this  and  that.  But  originally  it  must  have  been 
meant  as  Prak?^'ti  illuminated  and  intellectualised, 
and  rendered  capable  of  becoming  at  a  later  time  the 
germ  of  Aha?7ikara  (distinction  of  subject  and  object), 
Manas,  mind,  and  Indriyas,  apprehensive  senses.  Only 
after  PrakHti  has  become  lighted  up  or  perceptive, 
only  after  mere  material  contact  has  become  conscious- 

Y  2 


324  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ness,  can  we  imagine  the  distinction,  whether  general 
or  individual,  between  subject  and  object  (Aha??ikara), 
and  their  new  relation  as  perceiver  and  perceived,  as 
•  I '  on  one  side  and  '  this '  and  '  that '  on  the  other. 

This  may  seem  a  very  bold  interpretation,  and 
a  complete  forsaking  of  native  guidance,  but  unless 
a  more  reasonable  and  intelligible  account  can  be 
given  of  Buddhi,  there  seems  no  escape  from  it. 

What  native  interpreters  have  made  of  Buddhi 
may  be  seen  in  all  their  commentaries,  for  instance, 
VaA'aspati  -  Misra's  commentary  on  Karika  2  3  : 
'  Every  man  uses  first  his  external  senses,  then  he 
considers  (with  the  Manas),  then  he  refers  the 
various  objects  to  his  Ego  (Aha?wkara),  and  lastly 
he  decides  with  his  Buddhi  what  to  do.'  This  may 
be  quite  right  in  a  later  phase  of  the  development 
of  PrakHti,  it  cannot  possibly  be  right  as  representing 
the  first  evolution  of  PrakHti  from  its  chaotic  state 
towards  light  and  the  possibility  of  perception.  It 
could  not  be  the  antecedent  of  Ahamkara,  Manas, 
and  even  the  Tanmatras,  if  it  were  no  more  than  the 
act  of  fixing  this  or  that  in  thought.  I  am  glad  to 
find  that  Mr.  S.  C.  Banerji  on  p.  146  of  his  work 
arrives  at  much  the  same  conclusion. 

There  are  eight  manifestations  of  this  Buddhi 
(intellect),  (i)  Dharma,  virtue,  (2)  6r/lana,  knowledge, 
(3)  Vairagya,  dispassionateness,  (4)  Aisvarya,  super- 
human power. 

As  each  of  these  requires  explanation,  he  ex- 
plains them  by  a  very  favourite  process,  namely,  by 
contrasting  them  with  their  opposites,  and  saying 
that  (i)  Dharma,  virtue,  is  the  opposite  of  Adharma, 
vice,  and  is  enjoined  by  >S'ruti  and  Smn'ti,  revelation 
and  tradition.  It  is  not  opposed  to,  nay,  it  is  in 


BUDDHI.  325 

harmony  with,  the  practice  of  the  best  people,  and 
has  happiness  for  its  outward  mark. 

(2)  6r/iana  or  knowledge,  the  opposite  of  Agwana 
or  ignorance,  is  explained  as  the  understanding  of 
the    twenty-five    subjects    (Tattvas),    the  states    of 
thought  (Bhava),  and  the  elements  (Bhuta). 

(3)  Vairagya,  dispassionateness,  is  the  opposite  of 
passion,  and  consists  in  not  being  dependent  on  or 
influenced  by  external  objects,  such  as  sound,  &c. 

(4)  Aisvarya,  superhuman  power,  is  the  opposite 
of  powerlessness,  and  consists  of  the  eight  qualities 
such  as  Amman,  extreme  minuteness,  i.  e.  being  able 
to  assume  the  smallest  form  and  weight,  &c. ' 

These  four  kinds  of  intellect  (Buddhi)  are  classed 
as  Sattvika. 

Their  opposites  are  classed  as  Tamasa,  dark  or 
bad. 

Through  virtue,  as  a  means,  there  takes  place 
going  upward,  through  knowledge  there  arises 
liberation,  through  dispassionateness  men  are  ab- 
sorbed in  Praknti  (Prakrit ilaya?),  through  super- 
human power  there  comes  unfettered  movement. 

Thus  has  Buddhi  in  its  eight  forms  been  de- 
scribed. 

Synonyms  of  Buddhi  are,  Manas,  mind,  Mati, 
thought,  Mahat,  the  great,  Brahma2,  masc.,  Khyati, 
discrimination,  Pragma,  wisdom,  $ruti,  inspiration, 

1  These  Aisvaryas  are   believed  in  by  Sawkhya  and  Yoga, 
and  are  acquired   by  Yogins  by  means   of  long  and   painful 
practices. 

2  This  also  seems  out  of  place  here,  unless  the  Sawkhyas 
give  their  own  meaning  both  to  Brahman  and  Brahma.      In 
later  times  Buddhi,  taken  collectively,  becomes  the  Upadhi  or 
mental  limitation  of  Brahma  or  Hirawyagarbha. 


326  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Dhn'ti,    firmness,    Pragwanasantati,    continuity    of 
thought,  Srrm'ti,  memory,  and  DM,  meditation. 

It  is  quite  clear  that  in  all  these  explanations 
Buddhi  is  taken  as  intellect,  and  as  personal 
intellect,  and  that  the  idea  of  a  cosmic  stage  of 
intellectuality  has  been  entirely  forgotten.  Thus 
only  can  we  account  for  the  statement  that  this 
Buddhi,  if  dominated  by  Sattva  (Gu?za  of  purity), 
is  said  to  assume  the  form  (Rupa)  of  virtue,  know- 
ledge, dispassionateness,  and  superhuman  powers, 
while,  if  dominated  by  Tamas  (Gu?ia  of  darkness),  it 
takes  the  four  opposite  forms  of  vice,  &c.  How  could 
this  be  possible  before  the  distinction  between  sub- 
ject and  object  has  been  realised  by  Aha??ikara,  and 
before  Buddhi  has  assumed  the  character  of  sense- 
perception  (Buddhindriya?ii)  ?  We  have,  in  fact,  to 
read  the  Samkhya-philosophy  in  two  texts,  one,  as  it 
were,  in  the  old  uncial  writing  that  shows  forth  here 
and  there,  giving  the  cosmic  process,  the  other  in  the 
minuscule  letters  of  a  much  later  age,  interpreted  in 
a  psychological  or  epistemological  sense. 

Ahamkara. 

3.  Now,  he  asks,  What  is  called  Aha??ikara  ? 
And  he  answers,  '  It  is  Abhimana,  assumption  or 
misconception,  and  this  consists  in  the  belief  that 
I  am  in  the  sound,  i.  e.  I  hear,  I  feel,  I  see,  I  taste, 
and  I  smell,  I  am  lord  and  rich,  I  am  Isvara,  I  enjoy, 
I  am  devoted  to  virtue,  by  me  a  man  was  slain, 
I  shall  be  slain  by  powerful  enemies,  &c.' 

>S'a?yikara  in  his  commentary  on  the  Vedarita- 
Sutras  gives,  though  from  a  different  point  of  view, 
some  more  instances,  as  when  a  man,  because  his 
wife  and  children  are  unhappy,  imagines  that  he 


AHAMKARA.  327 

is  unhappy,  or  that  he  is  stout,  thin,  or  fair,  that 
he  stands,  walks,  or  jumps,  that  he  is  dumb, 
impotent,  deaf,  blind,  that  he  has  desires,  doubts, 
or  fears,  whereas  all  these  things  do  not  pertain 
to  him  at  all,  but  to  Prak?^'ti  only. 

'  Synonyms  of  Ahamkara,  or  rather  modifications 
of  it,  are  Vaikarika,  modifying,  Tair/asa,  luminous, 
Bhutadi,  the  first  of  elements,  Sanumana,  dependent 
on  inference,  Niranumana,  not  dependent  on  in- 
ference.' 

Here  we  must  distinguish  again  between  Aham- 
kara, as  a  cosmic  power,  and  Ahamkara  as  a 
condition  presupposed  in  any  mental  act  of  an 
individual  thinker.  Ahamkara  was  so  familiar  in 
the  sense  of  Egoism  that,  like  Buddhi,  it  was  taken 
in  its  ordinary  rather  than  in  its  technical  Samkhya 
sense.  I  quite  admit  that  this  is  a  somewhat  bold 
proceeding,  but  how  to  get  without  it  at  a  proper 
understanding  of  the  ancient  Samkhya,  the  rival 
of  the  Vedanta,  I  cannot  see.  We  must  remember 
that  Ahamkara,  whatever  it  may  mean  in  later 
times,  is  in  the  Samkhya  something  developed  out 
of  primordial  matter,  after  that  matter  has  passed 
through  Buddhi.  Buddhi  cannot  really  act  without 
a  distinction  of  the  universe  into  subject  and  object, 
without  the  introduction  of  the  Ego  or  I,  which 
again  is  impossible  without  a  Non-Ego,  or  something 
objective.  After  that  only  do  we  watch  the  develop- 
ment of  what  is  objective  in  general  into  what  is 
objectively  this  or  that  (the  Tanmatras).  But  while 
the  creation  of  what  is  subjective  and  objective  is 
the  only  possible  meaning  of  the  cosmic  Ahamkara, 
its  psychological  interpretation  is  far  more  easy. 
Thus  we  are  told  that  there  are  three  or  four 


328  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

modifications  of  the  Ahamk4ra,  (i)  the  Vaikarika, 
dominated  by  the  Sattva-gu?ia,  helps  to  do  good 
works ;  (2)  the  Tai^asa,  dominated  by  the  Ra^as- 
guwa,  helps  to  do  evil  works ;  (3)  the  Bhutadi, 
dominated  by  the  Tamas-gima,  helps  to  do  hidden 
works ;  (4)  the  Sanumana  Ahamkara  is  responsible 
for  unintentional  good ;  (5)  the  Niranumana,  for 
unintentional  evil  works.  This  division,  though 
rather  confused,  shows  at  all  events  that  the 
Aha?nkara  is  here  treated  as  simply  a  moral 
agent,  dominated  by  the  Gunas,  but  no  longer 
as  a  cosmic  potentia.  These  five  modes  of  Aham- 
kara are  spoken  of  as  Karmatmans  also,  i.  e.  the 
very  essence  of  our  acts,  while  in  another  place 
the  Tattva-samasa  itself  explains  that  Ahamkara 
should  be  taken  as  an  act  of  Buddhi  directed 
towards  the  perception  of  the  nature  of  what  is 
Self  (subjective)  or  Not-Self  (objective).  Though 
Ahamkara  means  only  the  production  of  Ego,  yet 
the  production  of  Ego  involves  that  of  the  Non-Ego, 
and  thus  divides  the  whole  world  into  what  is  sub- 
jective and  objective. 

Five  Tanmatras. 

4-8.  If  it  is  asked,  What  are  the  five  Tan- 
matras (substances)  ?  he  answers,  The  five  sub- 
stances or  essences  as  emanating  from  Ahamkara, 
the  essence  of  sound,  contact  colour,  savour,  and 
odour. 

The  essences  of  sound  are  perceived  in  sounds 
only.  Differences  of  sound,  such  as  acute,  grave, 
circumfiexed,  and  the  notes  of  the  gamut,  such  as 
Shac/r/a,  C,  /foshabha,  1),  Gandhara,  E,  Madhyama, 
F,  Pa/U'ama,  G,  Dliaivata,  A,  Nishada,  B,  are 


FIVE    TANMATRAS.  329 

perceived  ;  but  there  is  no  difference  in  the  essence 
of  sound. 

The  essences  of  touch  are  perceived  in  touch 
only.  Differences  of  touch,  such  as  soft,  hard, 
rough,  slippery,  cold,  and  hot,  are  perceived,  but 
there  is  no  difference  in  the  essence  of  touch. 

The  essences  of  colour  are  perceived  in  colour- 
only .  Differences  of  colour,  such  as  white,  red, 
black,  green,  yellow,  purple,  are  perceived,  but 
there  is  no  difference  in  the  essence  of  colour. 

The  essences  of  savour  are  perceived  in  savour- 
only.  Differences  of  savour,  such  as  pungent, 
bitter,  astringent,  corrosive,  sweet,  acid,  salt,  are 
perceived,  but  there  is  no  difference  in  the  essence 
of  savour. 

The  essences  of  odour  are  perceived  in  odour 
only.  Differences  of  odour,  such  as  sweet  and 
offensive,  are  perceived,  but  there  is  no  difference 
in  the  essence  of  odour. 

Thus  have  the  essences  been  indicated  ;  and  their 
synonyms,  though  sometimes  very  inaccurate  ones, 
are  said  to  be  :  Avisesha,  not  differentiated,  and 
therefore  not  perceptible,  Mahabhutas  (?),  the  great 
elements  ;  PrakHtis,  natures,  Abhogya,  not  to  be 
experienced,  Ami,  atomic,  Asanta,  not-pleasurable, 
Aghora,  not-terrible,  Amuc/Aa,  riot-stupid  ;  the  last 
three  being  negations  of  the  qualities  of  the 
Mahabhutas,  according  to  the  three  Gunas  pre- 
ponderating in  each.  And  if  it  is  asked  why 
these  eight  Prakritis  only,  from  Avyakta  to  the 
Tanmatras,  are  called  Prakritis,  the  answer  is 
because  they  alone  Prakurvanti,  they  alone  bring 
forth,  or  evolve. 


33°  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Sixteen  Vikaras. 

II.  If  it  be  asked  '  Which  are  the  sixteen  Vikaras 
or  evolutions  ? '  the  answer  is,  '  the  eleven  sense 
organs  (including  Manas),  and  the  five  elements.' 

Five  Buddhindriyas. 

9-13.  'Now  the  organs  are  set  forth;  the  ear, 
the  skin,  the  eyes,  the  tongue,  and  the  nose,  con- 
stitute the  five  Buddhindriyas,  or  perceptive  organs. 

The  ear  perceives  as  its  object  sound,  the  skin 
touch,  the  eye  colour,  the  tongue'  savour,  the  nose 
odour.' 

Being  produced  from  the  Tanmatras,  the  senses, 
as  perceiving,  are  represented  as  being  of  the  same 
nature  as  the  objects  perceived,  a  view  of  consider- 
able antiquity. 

Five  Karmendriyas. 

14-18.  'The  five  Karmendriyas  or  organs  of 
action,  voice,  hands,  feet,  the  organ  of  excretion, 
and  the  organ  of  generation,  perform  each  its  own 
work.  The  voice  utters  words,  the  hands  work, 
the  feet  perform  movement,  the  organ  of  excretion 
evacuation,  the  organ  of  generation  pleasure.' 

Manas. 

1 9.  '  Manas,  mind,  both  perceptive  and  active, 
performs  its  acts  of  doubting  and  ascertaining.' 

Central  organ  of  the  senses  or  KOLVOV  ala-OriTripiov 
might  be  the  nearest  approach  to  the  meaning  of 
Manas  ;  but  mind  may  do,  if  we  only  remember  its 
Sa??ikhya  definition,  as  perceptive,  like  the  other 
organs,  and  at  the  same  time  active  like  the 
Karmendriyas. 

'  Thus  have  the  eleven  organs  been  explained. 
Their  synonyms  are,  Kara/ta,  instruments,  Vaika- 


PURUSHA.  331 

rika,  changing,  Niyata,  special,  Padani,  appliances  \ 
AvadhHtani,  kept  under  (?),  Anu,  atomic,  Aksha2, 

organ.' 

Five  Mahabhfttas. 

20-24.  'The  Mahabhutas,  or  gross  elements,  are 
earth,  water,  light,  air,  and  ether.' 

Here  the  earth,  we  are  told,  helps  the  other  four, 
by  being  their  support.  Water  helps  the  other 
four  by  moistening.  Light  helps  the  other  four  by 
ripening.  Air  helps  the  other  four  by  drying. 
Ether  helps  the  other  four  by  giving  space. 

'  Earth  is  possessed  of  five  qualities,  sound,  touch, 
colour,  savour,  and  odour.  Water  is  possessed  of 
four  qualities,  sound,  touch,  colour,  and  savour. 
Light  is  possessed  of  three  qualities,  sound,  touch, 
and  colour.  Air  is  possessed  of  two  qualities,  sound 
and  touch.  Ether  has  one  quality,  sound.  Thus 
are  the  five  Mahabhutas  explained. 

Their  synonyms  are  :  Bhutas,  elements,  Bhuta- 
viseshas,  special  elements,  Vikaras,  modifications, 
Akritis,  species,  Tanu,  skin  (or  body  ?),  Vigraha, 
shapes,  /Santa,  pleasurable,  Ghora,  fearful,  Muc/Aa, 
stupid.  Thus  have  the  sixteen  Vikaras  been  de- 
scribed.' 

Purusha. 

III.  25.  Now  it  is  asked,  'What  is  the  Purusha  ? ' 
and  the  answer  is,  '  Purusha  is  without  beginning,  it 
is  subtle,  omnipresent,  perceptive,  without  qualities, 
eternal,  seer,  experiencer,  not  an  agent,  knower  of 
objects,  spotless,  not  producing.  Why  is  it  called 
Purusha  I  Because  of  its  being  old  (Pura?iat),  because 
it  rests  in  the  body  (Puri  say  ate),  and  because  it  serves 

1  Garbe,  Siunkhya-Philosophie,  p.  257. 

2  Or  Akshara,  imperishable  ? 


332  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

as  Purohita  (Director).'  These  are,  of  course,  fanciful 
etymologies  ;  and  we  can  hardly  doubt  that  we  have, 
in  the  name  of  Purusha,  a  recollection  of  the  Vedic 
Purusha,  one  of  the  many  names  of  the  supreme 
deity,  by  the  side  of  Visvakarman,  Hira?iyagarbha, 
Prat/apati,  &c.  Like  Brahman  when  conceived  as 
Atman,  Purusha  also  was  probably  used  both  for 
the  divine  and  for  the  human  side  of  the  same 
power.  It  is  the  multiplicity  only  of  the  Purusha 
which  is  peculiar  to  the  Sa??ikhya-philosophy. 

'  And  why  is  the  Purusha  without  beginning  ? 
Because  there  is  no  beginning,  no  middle,  and  no 
end  of  it.'  This  is  not  a  very  satisfactory  answer, 
but  it  is  probably  meant  for  no  more  than  that  we 
never  perceive  a  beginning,  middle,  or  end  of  it. 
Why  is  it  subtle  ?  Because  it  is  without  parts  and 
supersensuous.  Why  omnipresent  ?  Because,  like 
the  sky,  it  reaches  everything,  and  its  extent  is 
endless.  Why  perceptive  ?  Because  it  perceives 
(that  is,  for  a  time)  pleasure,  pain,  and  trouble. 
Why  without  qualities  ?  Because  the  qualities  of 
good,  indifferent,  and  bad  are  not  found  in  it. 
Why  eternal  ?  Because  it  was  not  made,  and 
cannot  be  made.  Why  seer  ?  Because  it  perceives 
the  modifications  of  Prakrtti.  Why  enjoy er  ?  Be- 
cause being  perceptive  it  perceives  (for  awhile) 
pleasure  and  pain.  Why  not  an  agent  ?  Because 
it  is  indifferent  and  without  the  qualities  (Gimas). 
Why  the  knower  of  body  or  of  objects  ?  Because  it 
knows  the  qualities  of  objective  bodies.  Why  spot- 
less ?  Because  neither  good  nor  evil  acts  belong  to 
the  Purusha.  Why  not-producing?  Because  it  has 
no  seed,  that  is,  it  can  produce  nothing.  Thus  has 
the  Purusha  of  the  Sawkhya  been  described. 


PURUSHA.  333 

The  synonyms  of  Purusha  are,  Atmari,  Self, 
Puman,  male,  Pumgu^a^antugivaA,  a  male  living 
creature,  Kshetragwa,  knower  of  objects  or  of  the 
body,  Nara,  man,  Kavi,  poet,  Brahman,  Akshara, 
indestructible,  Pi-ana,  spirit,  YaAkaA  ],  anybody, 
Sa£,  He. 

Thus  have  the  twenty-five  substances  been  de- 
scribed, viz.  the  eight  Prakn'tis,  the  sixteen  Vikaras, 
and  the  Purusha.  He  who  knows  these  twenty-five 
substances,  whatever  stage  of  life  he  may  be  in,  and 
whether  he  wear  matted  hair,  a  topknot,  or  be  shaven, 
he  is  liberated,  there  is  no  doubt.  This  verse  is 
often  quoted  by  Samkhya  philosophers.  Here,  it 
seems,  the  first  part  of  the  Tattva-samasa  is  ended, 
containing  a  list  of  the  twenty-five  Tattvas,  in  the 
three  divisions  of  Prakn'tis,  Vikaras,  and  Purusha. 

Purusha  (subject). 

I 

i.  Prakrit!  (object). 
Avyakta 


2.  Mahat  or  Buddhi  (light  and  intelligence  as  Samashii,  not  yet 

|  individualised). 

3.  Ahawzkara  (subjectivation). 

5  Tanmatras  (Sattvika)  10  Indriyas,  organs  (Ragasa)  +  i  Manas  (mind) 

(subtle  elements).  (5  Buddhindriyas,  5  Karmendriyas,  and  Manas). 

Tanmatras.  Buddhindriyas.  Karmendriyas. 

1.  Sound,  Sabda.  i.  Srotra,  hearing  in  ear.  r.  Speaking  in  tongue. 

2.  Touch,  Sparsa.  2.  TvaA1,  touch  in  skin.  2.  Grasping  in  hands. 

3.  Colour,  Rupa.  3.  A'akshus,  seeing  in  eye.  3.  Moving  in  feet. 

4.  Savour,  Rasa.  4.  Gihva,  tasting  in  tongue.  4.  Evacuating  in  Payu. 

5.  Odour,  Gandha.  5.  Ghraxa,  smelling  in  nose.  5.  Generating  in  Upasth;i. 

5  Mahabhutas  (Tamasa). 

1.  Akasa,  ether  (sabda). 

2.  Vayu,  air  (sabda  +  sparsa). 

3.  Te</as,  fire  (sabda  +  sparsa  +  rupa). 

4.  Ap,  water  (sabda  +  sparsa  +  rupa  +  rasa). 

5.  Pn'thivi,  earth  (sabda  +  sparsa  +  rupa  +  rasa  +  gandha). 


1  As  ya/i,  the  relative  pronoun  could  hardly  be  used  as  a 
name,  I  supposed  it  might  be  meant  for  the  indefinite  pronoun 
ya/ika/j,  but  this  is  doubtful. 


334  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Is  Purusha  an  Agent? 

Now  follow  a  number  of  special  questions,  which 
seemed  to  require  fuller  treatment.  The  first  is,  Is 
the  Purusha  an  agent,  or  is  he  not  ?  If  Purusha  were 
an  agent,  he  would  do  good  actions  only,  and  there 
would  not  be  the  three  different  kinds  of  action. 
The  three  kinds  of  action  are  (i)  Good  conduct,  called 
virtue  (Dharma),  which  consists  in  kindness,  control 
and  restraint  (of  the  organs),  freedom  from  hatred, 
reflection,  displaying  of  supernatural  powers. 

(2)  But  passion,  anger,  greed,  fault-finding,  violence, 
discontent,    rudeness,    shown   by   change    of   coun- 
tenance, these  are  called  indifferent  conduct. 

(3)  Madness,  intoxication,  lassitude,  nihilism,  de- 
votion to  women,  drowsiness,  sloth,  worthlessness, 
impurity,  these  are  called  bad  conduct. 

We  see  here  once  more  that  the  three  Gmias 
must  have  had  originally  a  much  wider  meaning 
than  is  here  described.  They  are  here  taken  as 
purely  moral  qualities,  whereas  originally  they  must 
have  had  a  much  larger  cosmic  sense.  They  are  not 
qualities  or  mere  attributes  at  all ;  they  are  on  the 
contrary  ingredients  of  Prakrit!  in  its  differentiation 
of  good,  indifferent,  bad  ;  bright,  dim  and  dark  ;  light, 
mobile,  heavy.  We  see  here  the  same  narrowing 
of  cosmical  ideas  which  we  had  to  point  out  before 
in  the  case  of  Buddhi  and  Ahamkara,  and  which, 
it  seems  to  me,  would  render  the  original  conception 
of  the  Samkhya-philosophy  quite  unmeaning.  We 
must  never  forget  that,  even  when  the  Suwkhya 
speaks  of  moral  qualities,  these  qualities  belong  to 
nature  as  seen  by  the  Purusha,  never  to  Purusha 
apart  from  Prakriti. 


IS    PURUSHA    ONE    OR    MANY?  335 

Three  Guwas. 

Whenever  this  triad  is  perceived  in  the  world  it 
is  clear  that  agency  belongs  to  the  Gunas,  and  it 
follows  that  Purusha  is  not  the  agent. 

Deceived  by  passion  and  darkness,  and  taking 
a  wrong  view  of  these  Gimas  which  belong  to 
Prakriti,  not  to  himself,  a  fool  imagines  that  he 
himself  is  the  agent,  though  in  reality  he  is  unable 
by  himself  to  bend  even  a  straw.  Nay,  he  becomes 
an  agent,  as  it  were,  foolish  and  intoxicated  by  vain 
imagination  and  saying,  '  All  this  was  made  by  me 
and  belongs  to  me.' 

And  then  it  is  said  (in  the  Bhagavad-gita  III,  2  7)  : 
'Acts  are  effected  by  the  qualities  (Gunas)  of  PrakHti 
in  every  way,  but  the  Self  (Atman),  deluded  by  the 
conceit  of  the  I  (Ahawikara),  imagines  that  the  I  is 
the  agent.' 

Ibid.  XIII,  31:- 

'  This  imperishable  supreme  Self,  from  being  with- 
out beginning  and  devoid  of  qualities,  neither  acts 
nor  suffers,  even  while  staying  in  the  body.' 

And  XIII,  29  :- 

'  He  sees  (aright)  who  looks  upon  actions  as  in 
all  respects  performed  by  Prakn'ti  alone,  and  upon 
the  Self  as  never  an  agent.' 

Is  Purusha  one  or  many? 

Now  comes  the  important  question,  Is  that 
Purusha  one  or  many?  The  answer  to  this  question 
divides  the  Samkhya  from  the  Vedanta-philosophy. 
The  Sa?nkhya  answer  is  that  the  Purusha  is  clearly 
many,  because  of  the  variety  in  the  acts  of  pleasure, 
pain,  trouble,  confusion  and  purifying  (of  race),  health, 


336  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

birth  and  death ;  also  on  account  of  the  stages  in  life 
(Asrama)  and  the  difference  of  caste  ( Vama).  If  there 
were  but  one  Purusha,  as  the  Vedantins  hold,  then 
if  one  were  happy,  all  would  be  happy  ;  if  one  were 
unhappy,  all  would  be  unhappy,  and  so  on  in  the 
case  of  people  affected  by  trouble,  confusion  of  race, 
purity  of  race,  health,  birth  and  death.  Hence 
there  is  not  one  Purusha,  but  many,  on  account  of 
the  manifoldness  indicated  by  form,  birth,  abode, 
fortune,  society  or  loneliness.  Thus  Kapila,  Asuri, 
Pan&asikha  and  Pata/l^ali,  and  all  other  Sawikhya 
teachers  describe  Purusha  as  many. 


Vedanta  Sayings. 

But  teachers  who  follow  the  Vedanta,  such  as 
Harihara,  Hiranyagarbha,  Vyasa  and  others,  describe 
Purusha  as  one.  And  why  so  ?  Because  (as  the 
Vedanta  says), 

1.  '  Purusha  is  all  this,  what  has  been  and  what  is 
to  be,  he  is  lord  of  that  immortality  which  springs 
up  by  (sacrificial)  food,  that    is,  he  is  beyond  the 
immortality  of  the  ordinary  immortal  gods  l. 

2.  That  is  Agni,  that  is  Vayu,  that  is  Surya,  that 
is  /ifandramas,  that  is  pure,  that  is  Brahman,  that  is 
water  and  Prar/apati  ~. 

3.  That  is  true,  that  is  immortal,  it  is  liberation, 


1  These  verses   arc    meant    to    represent   the   views   of   the 
Vedanta,    and   they  are   mostly   taken  from   the   Upanishads. 
The  first  from  ,S'vet.  Up.  Ill,  15,  occurs  also  Taitt.  Ar.  Ill, 
12,  i,  and  in  the  Eig-veda  X,  90,  2,  where  we  should  read,  Yat 
annenadhirohati,  see  Deussen,  Geschichte,  I,  p.  152. 

2  Mahanar.  Up.  I,  7  ;  cf.  Va#.  Sawih.  32,  i. 


VEDANTA    SAYINGS.  337 

it  is  the  highest  point,  it  is  indestructible,  it  is  the 
glory  of  the  sun  ; 

4.  Higher    than   which    there    is    nothing   else, 
nothing    smaller,    and    nothing    greater,    the    One 
stands  like   a   tree   planted   in   the    sky ;   by  him 
and  by  the  Purusha,  all  this  is  filled  ]. 

5.  Having   hands    and    feet   everywhere,   having 
mouth,  head  and  eyes   everywhere,  hearing  every- 
where in  this  world,  it  stands  covering  everything  ; 

6.  Shining2  through  the  qualities  (Guna)  of  all  the 
senses,  and  yet  free  from  all  the  senses,  the  master 
of  all,  the  Lord,  the  great  refuge  of  all ; 

7.  He  is  all  substances  everywhere,  the  Self  of 
all,  the  source  of  all ;  that  in  which  everything  is 
absorbed,  that  the  sages  know  as  Brahman. 

8.  For 3  there  is  but  one  Self  of  beings,  settled  in 
everybody,  it  is  seen  as  one  and  as  many,  like  the 
moon  in  the  water. 

9.  For   he    alone,  the  great    Self,  dwells    in   all 
beings,  whether  moving  or  motionless,  he  by  whom 
all  this  was  spread  out. 

10.  This  Self  of  the  world  is  one — by  whom  was 
it    made   manifold  ?     Some   speak   of   the    Self  as 
several,  because  of  the  existence  of  knowledge,  &c. 
(because  knowledge  is  different  in  different  people). 

11.  Wise4  people   see  the  same  (Atman)   in  the 
Brahman,  in  worms  and  insects,  in  the  outcast,  in 
the  dog  and  the  elephant,  in  beasts,  cows,  gadflies, 
and  gnats. 

12.  13.    As    one    and    the    same    string    passes 


1  £vet.  Up.  Ill,  9  ;  Mahanar.  Up.  X,  20. 

2  Svet,  Up.  Ill,  17  ;  cf.  Bhag.  Gita  XIII,  14. 

3  Brahmabindu  Up.  12.  4  Cf.  Bhag.  Gita  V,  18. 

z 


338  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

through  gold,  and  pearls,  jewels,  corals,  porcelain, 
and  silver,  thus  is  one  and  the  same  Self  to  be 
known  as  dwelling  everywhere  in  cows,  men,  and 
in  elephants,  deer,'  &c. 

We  see  in  these  extracts  a  mixture  of  Vedanta 
and  Samkhya  terms  and  ideas  ;  and  in  verse  10  the 
two  views  of  Brahman  being  one,  and  the  Purusha 
being  many,  are  given  in  the  same  breath. 

Early  Relation  between  Vedanta  and  Samkhya. 

The  relation  between  Samkhya  and  Vedanta 
during  the  Upanishad-period  is  by  no  means  clear. 
Most  scholars  seem  to  regard  it  as  a  kind  of  syn- 
cretism, but  it  may  also  represent  to  us  a  period 
of  philosophic  thought  when  these  two  views  of  the 
world  were  not  yet  finally  differentiated,  and  were 
not  felt  to  be  altogether  incompatible.  Though 
there  is  in  the  Upanishads  which  wre  possess  a 
decided  preponderance  of  a  Vedantic  interpretation 
of  the  world,  the  Samkhya  philosophers  are  not 
altogether  wrong  when  they  maintain  that  their 
view  also  can  be  supported  by  Yedic  authority. 
All  these  views  were  at  first  no  more  than  guesses 
at  truth,  gropings  in  the  dark  ;  but  the  idea  that 
if  the  one  was  right  the  other  must  be  wrong, 
belongs  decidedly  to  a  later  period,  to  that  of 
systematised  arid  controversial  philosophy.  There 
are  certain  technical  terms,  such  as  Purusha,  Buddhi, 
Gunas,  &c.,  which  are  looked  upon  as  the  pecu- 
liar property  of  the  Samkhya,  and  others,  such 
as  Atman,  Brahman,  Avidya,  Maya,  &c.,  which  re- 
mind us  at  once  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy  ;  but 
even  these  terms  are  used  far  more  freely  in  the 
Brahmawas  and  Upanishads  than  in  the  Darsanas, 


RELATION    BETWEEN    VEDANTA    AND    SAMKHYA.       339 

nor  are  they  always  used  in  the  same  sense  or  in 
the  same  order  by  earlier  and  later  authorities. 
Thus  we  read  in  the  Kanaka  Up.  Ill,  10,  1 1 :— 
'Beyond    the    senses    are    the    objects    (Artha), 
beyond  the  objects  is  the  mind  (Manas),  beyond  the 
mind  is  intellect  (Buddhi),  the  Great  Self  (Mahan 
Atma)  is  beyond  the  intellect.     Beyond  the  Great 
there  is  the  Undeveloped  (Avyakta),  beyond  the  un- 
developed there  is  the  Purusha.  Beyond  the  Purusha 
there  is  nothing,  that  is  the  goal,  the  highest  point.' 
In  the  same  Upanishad,  VI,  7,  8,  we  read  :— 
'  Beyond  the  senses  is  the  mind,  beyond  the  mind 
the  highest  being  (Sattvam  Uttamam),  higher  than 
that  being  is  the  great  Self  (Mahan  Atma),  beyond 
this  great  (Self)  is  the  highest,  the  Undeveloped. 

Beyond  the  Undeveloped  is  the  Purusha,  the 
all-pervading  and  imperceptible.  Every  creature 
that  knows  him  is  liberated,  and  obtains  immor- 
tality.' 

The  successive  development,  as  here  described, 
is  not  in  strict  accordance  with  the  systematic 
Samkhya,  but  still  less  does  it  represent  to  us 
Vedantic  ideas.  Even  the  two  accounts,  as  given 
in  the  same  Upanishad,  vary  slightly,  showing  to 
us  how  little  of  technical  accuracy  there  was  as  yet 
during  the  Upanishad-period.  We  get — 

III,  10,  ii.  VI,  7,  8. 

1.  Indriyas.  Indriyas. 

2.  Arthas. 

3.  Manas.  Manas. 

4.  Buddhi.  Sattvam  Uttamam. 

5.  Mahan  Atma.  MaMn  Atma. 

6.  Avyakta.  Avyakta. 

7.  Purusha.  Purusha. 

Z   2 


340  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

The  omission  of  the  Arthas  as  objects  would  not 
signify,  because,  as  Indriyarthas,  they  are  implied 
by  the  Indriyas  or  senses.  But  why  should  Buddhi, 
generally  the  first  emanation  of  PrakHti  in  its  un- 
developed (Avyakta)  state,  be  replaced  by  Sattvam 
Uttamam,  the  Highest  Being  ?  The  word  may  be 
meant  for  Buddhi,  for  Buddhi  is  often  called  Mahat, 
the  Great,  but  why  it  should  be  called  Great  is 
difficult  to  say.  It  is  certainly  not  an  equiva- 
lent of  the  Phenician  Mot,  as  Professor  Wilson 
conjectured  many  years  ago  l.  Mahfm  Atm&  looks 
like  a  Vedantic  term,  but  even  then  it  would  only 
occupy  the  place  of  (rivatma,  the  individualised 
Self,  and  how  could  this  be  said  to  emanate  from 
the  Avyakta  ? 

Another  passage  which  reminds  us  of  Sa?«khya 
rather  than  of  Vedanta-philosophy  occurs  in  the 
Maitray.  Up.  II,  5,  where  we  read  :  '  He  who  has  the 
name  of  Purusha,  and  is  very  small,  intangible, 
invisible,  dwells  of  his  own  will 2  here  in  part 3,  as 
a  man  who  is  fast  asleep  awakes  of  his  own  will. 
And  this  part,  which  is  entirely  intelligent,  present 
in  every  single  man,  knowing  the  body,  attested  by 
conceiving  (Manas),  willing  (Buddhi),  and  belief  in 
subject  and  object  (Ahawk;.ira)  is  Pra/yapati,  called 


1  See  Samkhya-Sutras  I,  61,  71  ;  the  Ekadasakam  is  Sattvi- 
kam,  cf.  II,  1 8,  that  is  the  live  Buddhindriyas,  the  five  Kar- 
mendriyas,   and   the  Manas ;    see  Garbe,   Sawkhya-pravafcana- 
bhashya,  p.  i8H. 

2  The    Anubhuti-praka.s'a     roads    Buddhipurvam,     Deussen 
translates  Abuddhipurvam. 

3  As  to  the  idea  of  parts  (Awsa),  see  Vedanta-Sutras  II, 
3,  43,  and  Thibaut's  remarks  in  his  Introduction,  p.  xcvii. 


EELATION    BETWEEN    VEDANTA    AND    SAA/KHYA.        341 

Visva.     By  him,  the  intelligent,  is  the  body  made 
intelligent,  and  he  is  the  driver  thereof.' 

This  passage  does  not  contain  much  of  Samkhya 
thought,  yet  the  words  Purusha  and  possibly 
Buddhipiirvam  seem  to  allude  to  Kapila's  ideas 
rather  than  to  those  of  Badarayana.  Other  words 
also,  such  as  Samkalpa,  Adhyavasaya  and  Abhimana, 
in  the  sense  of  Aha?nkara,  point  to  the  same  source. 
The  whole  passage,  however,  is  obscure,  nor  does 
the  commentator  help  us  much,  unless  he  is  right 
in  recognising  here  the  germs  of  the  later  Vedantic 
ideas  of  a  Pra^/apati,  called  Visva  or  Vaisvanara 
(Vedanta-sara,  $  138),  Tau/asa  and  Pragma. 

One  more  passage  of  the  Maitray.Upanishad,  III,  2, 
may  here  be  mentioned,  as  reminding  us  of  S&mkhya 
doctrines.  There  we  read  :  '  There  is  indeed  that 
other  different  one,  called  the  elemental  Self  (Bhut- 
atma)  who,  overcome  by  the  bright  and  dark  fruits 
of  action,  enters  on  a  good  or  evil  birth,  so  that  his 
course  is  upward  or  downward,  and  that  over- 
powered by  the  pairs  (the  opposites)  he  roams 
about.  And  this  is  the  explanation.  The  five 
Tanmatras  (of  sound,  touch,  light,  taste,  and  smell) 
are  called  Bhuta  (elements),  and  the  five  Maha- 
bhutas  (gross  elements)  also  are  called  Bhuta.  Then 
the  aggregate  of  all  these  is  called  /Sarira,  body,  and 
he  who  dwells  in  that  body  is  called  Bhutatman  (the 
elementary  Atman).  True,  his  immortal  Atman 
(Self)  remains  untainted,  like  a  drop  of  water  on  a 
lotus-leaf;  but  he,  the  Bhutatman,  is  in  the  power  of 
the  Gunas  of  Prakn'ti.  Then,  thus  overpowered,  he 
becomes  bewildered,  and  because  thus  bewildered, 
he  sees  not  the  creator,  i.  e.  the  holy  Lord,  abiding 
within  him.  Carried  along  by  the  Gimas,  darkened, 


342  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

unstable,  fickle,  crippled,  full  of  devices,  vacillating, 
he  enters  into  Abhimana  (conceit  of  subject  and 
object),  believing  "I  am  he,  this  is  mine,"  &c.  He 
binds  himself  by  himself,  as  a  bird  is  bound  by  a  net, 
and,  overcome  afterwards  by  the  fruits  of  what  he  has 
done,  he  enters  on  a  good  or  evil  birth,  downward 
or  upward  in  his  course,  and,  overcome  by  the  pairs, 
he  roams  about.' 

Here  we  see  again  a  mixture  of  Samkhya  and 
Vedanta  ideas,  the  Samkhya  claiming  such  terms 
as  Prakriti  and  Gums,  the  Vedanta  such  terms  as 
Atman  and  possibly  Bhutatman.  This  Bhutatman, 
however,  is  by  no  means  so  clear  as  has  sometimes 
been  imagined.  It  is  a  term  peculiar  to  the  Maitray. 
Upanishad,  and  seems  to  have  been  borrowed  from 
it  when  it  occurs  in  some  of  the  later  Upanishads. 
If,  like  many  other  things  in  the  Maitray.  Upanishad, 
it  is  to  be  looked  upon  as  belonging  to  the  Samkhya- 
system,  we  must  remember  that  Atman,  though 
quoted  sometimes  as  a  synonym  of  Purusha,  cannot 
be  supposed  to  stand  here  for  Purusha.  A  com- 
pound such  as  Bhuta-Purusha  would  be  impossible. 
The  Maitray.  Up.  Ill,  i  itself  says  that  the  Atman 
of  Bhutatman  is  another,  though  likewise  called 
Atman,  and  that  he  dwells  in  the  body,  $arira, 
which  is  a  compound  of  Tanmatras,  Bhutas,  and 
Mahabhutas.  It  would  therefore  correspond  to  the 
Vedaritic  (rivatman.  But  if  this  Bhutatman  is 
said  to  spring  from  Prak?viti,  it  could  not  possibly 
stand  for  the  Purusha  of  the  Sawkhyas,  because 
their  Purusha  does  not  spring  from  Prak?v'ti,  as 
little  as  Prakriti  springs  from  him.  Nor  could  any 
Atman  be  said  to  be  purely  objective.  In  fact, 
strictly  speaking,  this  Bhutatman  fits  neither  into 


TRAIGU^YA.  343 

the  Vedanta,  nor  into  the  Samkhya-philosophy,  and 
would  rather  seem  to  belong  to  a  philosophy  in 
which  these  two  views  of  the  world  were  not  yet 
finally  separated. 

Another  difficult  and  rather  obscure  expression 
in  the  Maitray.  Upanishad  is  Niratman  (selbstlos],  an 
expression  which  would  be  impossible  in  the  Vedanta- 
philosophy,  and  is  certainly  perplexing  even  in  the 
Samkhya. 

A  similar  mixture  of  philosophical  terms  meets  us 
in  the  $vetasvatara  Upanishad.  In  verse  I,  10,  for 
instance,  we  have  Pradhana,  which  is  Samkhya,  and 
Maya,  which  is  Vedanta,  at  least  the  later  Vedanta, 
while  in  IV,  10  Maya  is  directly  identified  with 
Praknti.  Purusha  occurs  in  III,  12,  where  it 
evidently  stands  for  Brahman,  IV,  i.  But  though 
in  this  Upanishad  Samkhya  ideas  would  seem  to 
prevail,  Vedanta  ideas  are  not  excluded.  The  very 
name  of  Samkhya1  and  Yoga  occurs  (VI,  13),  but 
the  name  of  Vedanta  also  is  not  absent,  VI,  22.  In 
all  this  we  may  possibly  get  a  glimpse  of  a  state  of 
Indian  philosophy  which  was,  as  yet,  neither  pure 
Samkhya  nor  pure  Vedanta,  unless  we  look  on  these 
Upanishads  as  of  a  far  more  modern  date,  and  on 
their  philosophy  as  the  result  of  a  later  syncretism. 

Traiguwya. 

IV.  If  now  we  return  to  the  Tattva-samasa, 
we  meet  first  of  all  with  some  more  remarks 
about  the  three  Gunas,  Sattva,  explained  as 

1  Sawkhya  should  be  here  taken  as  the  title  of  the  two 
systems,  Samkhya  and  Yoga,  or  better  still  as  one  word, 
Samkhyayoga.  It  cannot  well  mean  Priifung, 


344  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

virtue,  purity,  goodness  ;  Ra^as,  explained  as  dust, 
mist,  passion,  movement,  and  Tamas,  darkness,  as 
ignorance.  Colebrooke  had  already  warned  us 
against  taking  the  Gunas  of  the  S£mkhya  in  the 
sense  of  qualities.  '  These  three  qualities,'  he  says, 
'  are  not  mere  accidents  of  nature,  but  are  of  its 
essence,  and  enter  into  its  composition  like  different 
rivers  forming  one  stream,  though  for  a  time  retain- 
ing their  different  colours.'  Constituent  '  parts  ' 
might  be  a  better  rendering,  but  for  the  present  it 
is  best  to  retain  Guna,,  there  being  neither  thought 
nor  word  in  English  corresponding  to  Gu?ia,  as 
defined  in  the  Samkhya.  We  ourselves  have  in- 
herited our  ideas  of  substance  and  quality  from 
Greek  and  medieval  philosophers,  but  even  with  us 
a  definition  of  inherent  qualities  is  by  no  means 
easy,  considering  that  our  substances  never  exist 
without  qualities,  nor  our  qualities  without  sub- 
stances. Our  commentary  continues  :— 

He  now  asks,  What  is  the  triad  of  Gu?ias  ?  and 
the  answer  is,  the  triad  consists  of  Goodness,  Pas- 
sion, and  Darkness.  The  triad  of  Gu?^as  means  the 
three  Guwas. 

Goodness  (Sattva)  is  of  endless  variety,  such  as 
calmness,  lightness,  complacency,  attainment  of  what 
is  wished  for,  contentment,  patience,  joy,  &c.  In 
short  it  consists  of  happiness. 

Passion  is  of  endless  variety,  such  as  grief,  dis- 
tress, separation,  excitement,  attainment  of  what  is 
evil,  itc.  In  short  it  consists  of  pain. 

Darkness  is  of  endless  variety,  such  as  covering, 
ignorance,  disgust,  misery,  heaviness,  sloth,  drowsi- 
ness, intoxication,  &c.  In  short  it  consists  of  trouble 
or  madness. 


SAjYA'ARA    AND    PEATISA^A'ARA.  345 

Thus  far  has  the  triad  of  the  Gunas  been  ex- 
plained. Let  it  be  known  that  goodness  is  all  that 
is  bright,  passion  all  that  excites,  and  darkness  all 
that  is  not  bright.  This  is  what  is  named  Trai- 
gunya. 

These  Gimas  have  been  again  and  again  explained 
as  Dravyam,  matter  ;  quality  and  what  is  qualified 
being  considered  in  the  Samkhya  as  inseparable. 
The  four  sides  of  a  cube,  for  instance,  would  be 
called  its  Gmias  as  much  as  the  blue  of  the  sky. 
These  Gunas  act  a  very  prominent  part  in  Indian 
philosophy,  and  have  quite  entered  into  the  sphere 
of  popular  thought.  We  can  best  explain  them  by 
the  general  idea  of  two  opposites  and  the  middle 
term  between  them,  or  as  Hegel's  thesis,  anti- 
thesis and  synthesis,  these  being  manifested  in 
nature  by  light,  darkness,  and  mist  ;  in  morals  by 
good,  bad,  and  indifferent,  with  many  applications 
and  modifications.  If  the  Samkhyas  look  on  cer- 
tain objects  as  happy  instead  of  happifying,  &c.,  we 
should  remember  that  we  also  call  sugar  sweet, 
meaning  that  it  calls  forth  the  sensation  of  sweet- 
ness in  us.  The  Hindus  look  upon  the  state  of 
equilibrium  of  the  three  Gmias  as  perfect,  and  they 
see  in  the  preponderance  of  any  one  of  them  the 
first  cause  of  movement  and  activity  in  Prakriti  or 
nature,  in  fact  the  beginning  of  creation. 

Saw/iara  and  Pratisawytara. 

V,  VI.  Then  comes  the  question,  What  is 
San&ara  and  what  is  Pratisa?I&ara  ?  The  answer 
is,  San&ara  is  evolution,  Pratisafl&ara  dissolution  or 
re-involution.  Evolution  is  as  follows  :  From  the 
Avyakta  (undeveloped  Praknti)  before  explained, 


346  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

when  superintended  by  the  high  and  omnipresent 
Purusha  (Spirit),  Buddhi  (intellect)  arises,  and  this 
of  eight  kinds.  From  this  Buddhi,  the  substance  of 
intellect,  arises  Aha??ikara  (conceit  of  I,  or  sub- 
jectivity). Ahawkara  is  of  three  kinds,  Vaikarika, 
modified,  that  is,  modified  of  Sattva '  ;  Tau/asa, 
luminous,  as  under  the  influence  of  llamas  producing 
the  Buddhindriyas  ;  and  Bhutadi  (first  of  elements). 
From  the  modified  or  Vaikarika  Aha??ikara,  which 
under  the  influence  of  Tamas  produces  the  gross 
material  elements,  spring  the  gods  and  the  senses  ; 
from  the  first  of  elements,  Bhutadi,  the  Tanmatras 
(essences)  ;  from  the  luminous,  Tair/asa,  both.  From 
the  Tanmatras,  essences,  are  produced  the  material 
elements.  This  is  the  development  or  Sa/U'ara. 
Pratisa?7/:ara  or  dissolution  is  as  follows  :  The 
material  elements  are  dissolved  into  the  essences, 
Tanmatras,  the  essences  and  senses  into  Aha?»kara, 
Aha??ikara  into  Buddhi  (intellect),  Buddhi  into 
Avyakta  (the  undeveloped),  all  being  different  forms 
of  Prak?'tti.  The  Undeveloped  is  nowhere  dis- 
solved, because  it  was  never  evolved  out  of  any- 
thing. Know  both  Prakrit!  and  Purusha  as  having 
no  beginning.  Thus  has  dissolution  been  explained. 

Adhyatma,  Adhibhtlta,  and  Adhidaivata. 

VII-IX.  Now  it  is  asked,  What  is  meant  by 
Adhyatma  (subjective),  Adhibhuta  (objective),  and 
Adhidaivata  (pertaining  to  deity)  ?  To  this  it  is 
answered,  Intellect  is  subjective,  what  is  to  be  per- 
ceived is  objective,  Brahma  is  deity.  Ahamkara  is 
subjective,  what  is  to  be  received  and  perceived  by 

1  Gurbe,  Samkhya- Philosophic,  p.  236. 


ADHYATMA,    ADHIBHUTA,    AND    ADHIDAIVATA.      347 

it  is  objective,  Rudra  is  the  deity.  Manas,  mind, 
is  subjective,  what  is  to  be  conceived  is  objective, 
-/Tandra,  moon,  is  the  deity.  The  ear  is  subjective, 
what  is  to  be  heard  is  objective,  Akasa,  ether,  is  the 
deity.  The  skin  is  subjective,  what  is  to  be  touched 
is  objective,  Vayu,  wind,  is  the  deity.  The  eye  is 
subjective,  what  is  to  be  seen  is  objective,  Aditya, 
the  sun,  is  the  deity.  The  tongue  is  subjective, 
what  is  to  be  tasted  is  objective,  Varuna  !  is  the 
deity.  The  nose  is  subjective,  what  is  to  be  smelled 
is  objective,  Earth  is  the  deity.  The  voice  is  sub- 
jective, what  is  to  be  uttered  is  objective,  Agni,  fire, 
is  the  deity.  The  two  hands  are  subjective,  what 
is  to  be  grasped  is  objective,  Indra  is  the  deity. 
The  feet  are  subjective,  what  has  to  be  gone  over 
is  objective,  Vishnu  is  the  deity.  The  organ  of 
excretion  is  subjective,  what  is  to  be  excreted  is 
objective,  Mitra  is  the  deity.  The  organ  of  genera- 
tion is  subjective,  what  is  to  be  enjoyed  is  objective, 
Pragdpati,  lord  of  creatures,  is  the  deity.  Thus  in 
the  case  of  each  of  the  thirteen  instruments  is  there 
what  is  subjective,  what  is  objective,  and  the  deity. 
Whoever  has  properly  learnt  the  substances,  the 
forms  of  the  qualities  (Gu?^asvarupa^i),  and  the 
deity  (Adhidaivatam)  is  freed  from  evil  and  released 
from  all  his  sins ;  he  experiences  the  qualities 
(Gu?ias),  but  is  not  united  to  them.  Here  ends 
the  discussion  of  the  Tattvas  (substances)  2. 

1  Evidently  taken  already  as  god  of  the  waters. 

2  I  ought  to  say  that  in  this  and  the  subsequent  paragraphs 
I  had  often  to  be  satisfied  with  giving  the  words  such  as  they 
stand,  without  being  myself  able  to  connect  any  definite  ideas 
with  them.     I  did  not  like  to  leave  them  out  altogether,  but 
while  they  may  be  safely  passed  over  by  philosophical  readers, 


348  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Abhibuddhis  (5). 

X.  Now  what  are  the  five  Abhibuddhis  (appre- 
hensions) ?  The  answer  is,  They  are  Vyavasaya, 
ascertainment,  Abhimana,  conceit,  I/t&Aa,  desire, 
Kartavyata,  determination  to  act  or  will,  Kriya, 
action. 

The  apprehension  that  this  has  to  be  done  by  me 
is  ascertainment ;  an  act  of  the  intellect.  Abhimana, 
conceit,  is  directed  towards  the  perception  of  the 
nature  of  Self  and  not-Self,  it  is  Ahamkara,  an  act 
of  the  intellect.  Lkkhh,  desire,  is  wish,  an  idea  of 
the  mind,  an  act  of  the  intellect.  Kartavyata,  the 
will  of  doing  such  acts  as  hearing,  &c.,  performed 
by  the  senses  that  have  sound,  &c.,  for  their  objects, 
is  an  act  of  the  intellect  pertaining  to  the  Bud- 
dhindriyas.  Kriya,  the  act  of  the  intellect,  such  as 
speaking,  &c.,  pertaining  to  the  Karmendriyas,  is 
action  '.  Thus  have  five  Abhibuddhis  (apprehen- 
sions) been  explained. 

Karmayonis  (5). 

XL  What  are  the  five  Karmayonis  ?  The  answer 
is  that  they  are  Dhr/ti,  energy,  /Sraddha,  faith  or 
faithfulness,  Sukha,  bliss,  Avividisha,  carelessness, 
Vividisha,  desire  of  knowledge. 

O 

The  character  of  Dhr/ti  or  energy  is  when  a  man 
resolves  and  carries  out  his  resolution.  $raddha,  faith 
or  faithfulness,  is  said  to  consist  in  study  of  the  Veda 


they  may,  I  hope,  elicit  from  Sanskrit  scholars  some  better 
elucidation  than  I  am  ablo  to  #ivo.  At  present  most  of  them 
seem  to  me  to  consist  of  useless  distinctions  and  hair-splitting 
definitions  of  words. 

1  The  text  is  somewhat  doubtful. 


KARMAYONIS.  349 

religious  studentship,  sacrificing  and  causing  sacri- 
fices to  be  performed,  penance,  giving  and  receiving- 
proper  gifts,  and  making  Homa-oblations. 

But  Sukha  or  bliss  arises  when  a  man,  in  order 
to  obtain  blessedness,  devotes  himself  to  knowledge, 
sacrifices  and  penance,  being  always  engaged  in 
penitential  acts. 

AvividisM  or  carelessness  consists  in  the  heart's 
being  absorbed  in  the  sweetness  of  sensual  pleasures. 

Vividisha  or  desire  of  knowledge  is  the  source  of 
knowledge  of  thoughtful  people.  What  has  to  be 
known  is  the  oneness  (belonging  to  Prakn'ti),  the 
separateness  (ofPurushaandPraknti),  &c.,  (Prakr/ti) 
being  eternal,  and  not-percipient,  subtle,  with  real 
products,  and  not  to  be  disturbed ;  and  this  is 
Vividisha.  ...  It  is  a  state  belonging  to  Prakriti 
destroying  cause  and  effect.  Thus  have  the  five 
Karmayonis  been  explained  (?). 

Some  portions  of  these  verses  are  obscure,  and 
the  text  is  probably  corrupt.  I  have  taken  Grneyft, 
for  6rneyam,  referring  to  each  of  the  subjects  with 
which  Vividisha,  the  desire  of  knowledge,  is  con- 
cerned. The  construction  is  very  imperfect,  but 
may  be  excused  in  what  is  after  all  no  more  than 
an  index.  I  separate  Sukshmam  and  take  it  in  the 
sense  of  Sukshmatvam.  Satkaryam  refers  to  the 
Satkaryavada.  The  third  line  is  quite  unintelligible 
to  me,  and  Ballantyne  has  very  properly  left  it 
altogether  untranslated.  It  may  mean  that  Vivi- 
dishti  is  a  state  belonging  to  Prakriti  which  helps 
to  destroy  cause  and  effect  by  showing  that  they 
are  one  and  the  same,  but  this  is  a  mere  guess. 


350  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Vayus  (5). 

XII.  What  are  the  Vayus  (winds)  ?  They  are 
Prana,  Apana,  Samana,  Udana,  and  Vyana,  i.e.  the 
winds  in  the  bodies  of  those  who  have  bodies.  The 
wind  called  Prana  is  superintended  by  mouth  and 
nose,  and  is  called  Pra»a  because  it  leads  out  or 
moves  out.  The  wind  called  Apana  is  superintended 
by  the  navel,  and  is  called  Apana  because  it  leads 
away  and  moves  downward.  The  wind  called  Samana 
is  superintended  by  the  heart,  and  is  called  Samana 
because  it  leads  equally  and  moves  equally.  The 
wind  called  Udana  is  superintended  by  the  throat. 
It  is  called  Udana  because  it  goes  upward  and 
moves  out.  Vyana  is  the  all-pervader.  Thus  have 
the  five  wrinds  been  explained. 

The  real  meaning  of  these  winds  has  never  been 
discovered.  If  they  are  rendered  by  vital  spirits, 
nothing  is  gained  except  explaining  obscurum  per 
obscurius.  They  may  have  been  intended  to 
account  for  the  vital  processes  which  make  the 
action  of  the  senses  (Indriyas)  and  of  other  organs  of 
the  body  also,  possible,  but  their  original  intention 
escapes  us  altogether.  They  form  a  kind  of  physical 
organism  or  AntaAkara^a,  but  their  special  functions 
are  often  stated  differently  by  different  authors. 

Karmatmans  (5). 

XIII.  What  are  the  five  Karmatmans,  the  (Ego  as 
active)  ?  They  are  Vaikarika,  Tair/asa,  Bhutadi,  Sanu- 
mana,  and  Niranumana.  The  Vaikarika,  modifying, 
is  the  doer  of  good  works.  The  Tauyasa,  luminous, 
is  the  doer  of  bad  works.  The  Bhutadi  ',  first  of 

1  Bhutadi  is  used  in  the  sense  of  Manas,  because  the  Bhutas, 
though  springing  from  the  Tanmatras,  are  due  to  it. 


ASAKTT,    WEAKNESS.  351 

elements,  is  the  doer  of  hidden  works.  If  associated 
with  inference  (Sanumana),  the  Aha?ttkara  is  the  doer 
of  what  is  good  and  reasonable  ;  if  not  associated 
with  inference  (Niranumana)  it  is  the  doer  of  what 
is  not  good  and  not  reasonable.  Thus  have  the 
five  Karmatmans  been  explained. 

Avidya,  Nescience  (5). 

XIV.  What  is  the  fivefold  Avidya  (Nescience)  ?    It 
is  Tamas,  darkness,  Moha,  illusion,  Mahamoha,  great 
illusion,  Tamisra,  gloom,  Andhatamisra,  utter  gloom. 
Here  darkness  and  illusion  are  again  each  eightfold, 
great  illusion  is  tenfold,  gloom  and  utter  gloom  are 
eighteenfold.     Tamas,  darkness,  is  the  misconception 
that  Self  is  identical  with  things  which  are  not  Self, 
namely  with  PrakHti,  Avyakta,  Buddhi,  Ahamkara, 
and  the  five  Tanmatras.   Moha,  illusion,  is  the  miscon- 
ception arising  from  the  obtaimnent  of  supernatural 
powers,  such  as  minuteness  and  the  rest.    Mahamoha, 
great  illusion,  is  when  one  supposes  oneself  to  be 
liberated  in  the  ten  states  with  regard  to  the  objects 
of  sound,   colour,  &c.,  whether  heard  or  seen,  &c. 
Gloom  is  unrestrained  hatred,  directed  against  the 
eightfold  superhuman  powers,  such  as  minuteness. 
&c.,  and  against  the  tenfold  w^orld  of  sense  causing 
threefold  pain.     Utter  gloom  is  that  distress  which 
arises  at  the  time  of  death  after  the  eightfold  human 
power  has  been  acquired,  and  the  tenfold  world  of 
sense  has  been  conquered.    Thus  has  ignorance  writh 
sixty-two  subdivisions  been  explained. 

Asakti,  Weakness  (28). 

XV.  What  is  called  the  twenty-eightfold  weakness  (• 
The  faults  of  the  eleven  organs  of  sense  and  the 
seventeen  faults  of  the  intellect.     First,  with  regard 


352  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

to  the  organs  of  sense,  there  is  deafness  in  the  ear, 
dullness  in  the  tongue,  leprosy  in  the  skin,  blindness 
in  the  eye,  loss  of  smell  in  the  nose,  dumbness  in 
the  voice,  crippledness  in  the  hands,  lameness  in  the 
feet,  constipation  in  the  organ  of  excretion,  impotence 
in  the  organ  of  generation,  madness  in  the  mind  ; 
these  are  defects  of  the  eleven  organs.  The  seventeen 
defects  of  the  intellect  are  the  opposites  of  the  Tushds, 
contentments,  and  of  the  Siddhis,  perfections. 

Atushfa  and  Tushft. 

XVI.  First  then  the  opposites  of  the  Tushfis  or 
the  contentments.    They  are  Ananta,  the  conviction 
that  there  is  no  Pradhana  (Prakrit!)  ;   Tamasalina, 
consisting  in  recognising  the  Atman  in  the  Mahat 
(Buddhi,  intellect) ;   Avidya,  the  non-recognition  of 
the  Ego  (Ahamkara) ;  Avrish^i,  the  denial  that  the 
Tanmatras,  essences,  are  the  causes  of  the  elements  ; 
Asutara,  occupation  in  acquiring  the  objects  of  the 
senses  ;    Asupara,  occupation  in  their  preservation  ; 
Asunetra,  occupation  for  wealth,  without  seeing  that 
it  is  liable  to  be  lost  ;  AsumarUika,  addiction  to  en- 
joyment ;  Anuttamambhasika,  engaging  in  enjoyment 
without  seeing  the  evil  of  injury  (to  living  beings). 
Thus  have  the  nine  opposites  of  Tushd,  contentment, 
been  explained. 

Asiddhis  and  Siddhis. 

XVII.  Next  follow  the  opposites  of  Siddhi,  perfec- 
tion, which  are  also  called  Asiddhis,  non-perfections: 
Atara,  when  diversity  is  mistaken  for  phenomenal 
unity  ;  Sutara,  when,  after  hearing  words  only,  the 
opposite  is  understood,  as,  for  instance,  when  after 
hearing  that  a  man  who  knows  the  various  principles 


TUSHTIS    AND    SIDDHIS.  353 

(tattvas)  is  liberated,  a  man  understands  the  op- 
posite, that  such  a  man  is  not  liberated  ;  Ataratara, 
ignorance,  when  a  man,  though  devoted  to  hearing 
and  studying,  does  not  succeed  in  knowing  the 
twenty-five  principles,  owing  either  to  his  obtuseness 
or  to  his  intellect  being  impaired  by  false  doctrines. 
If  a  man,  though  overcome  by  mental  suffering,  is  not 
anxious  to  know,  being  careless  as  to  transmigration, 
so  that  knowledge  is  no  pleasure  to  him,  this  is 
Apramoda.  Thus  the  next  pair  also  of  Apramu- 
dita  (mutually  not  delighted)  and  Apramodamana 
(mutually  not  delighting)  should  be  considered. 
Ignorance  of  a  man  of  undecided  mind  even  with 
regard  to  what  has  been  taught  him  by  a  friend  is 
Arasya.  But  failure  of  an  unfortunate  man  in  ob- 
taining knowledge,  either  because  of  bad  instruction 
or  disregard  on  the  part  of  the  teacher,  is  Asat- 
pramuditam.  Thus  have  the  eight  Asiddhis,  the 
opposite  of  the  Siddhis  or  perfections,  been  ex- 
plained, and  the  twenty-eightfold  A^akti  (weakness) 
is  finished. 

Tushfts  and  Siddhis. 

Xext  follow  the  Tushris  and  Siddhis  themselves, 
but  as  their  opposites  have  already  been  examined 
we  may  dispense  with  their  enumeration  here.  Some 
of  these  technical  terms  vary  in  different  texts,  but 
they  are  of  very  small  importance  l.  I  am  afraid 
that  even  what  I  have  given  of  these  long  lists, 

1  The  names  of  the  nine  Tushfis  or  contentments  are  : 
Ambhas.  water.  Salila,  Ogha.  Vr/shfi,  Sutara,  Supara.  Su- 
netra,  SuniariAika.  Uttama  Sattviki.  The  names  of  the  eight 
Siddhis  are :  Tara,  Sutara.  Tarayanti.  Prainoda,  Pramudita. 
Pramodarnana,  Kainyaka,  Satpramudita. 

A  a 


354  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

which  are  so  characteristic  of  the  Sa??ikhya-philo- 
sophy,  may  have  proved  very  tedious,  and  not  very 
closely  connected  with  the  great  problems  of  philo- 
sophy. I  confess  that  in  several  cases  many  of  these 
subdivisions  seemed  to  me  entirely  meaningless,  but 
I  thought  that  they  were  of  some  importance  his- 
torically, and  for  a  right  appreciation  of  the  methods 
of  Indian  philosophy.  The  long  lists  of  the  instru- 
ments and  the  acts  of  intellect,  of  the  sources  of 
activity,  of  Nescience  with  its  sixty-two  subdivi- 
sions, &c.,  though  certainly  meaningless  to  my  mind, 
may  possibly  serve  to  show  how  long  and  how 
minutely  these  philosophical  questions  must  have 
been  discussed  in  order  to  leave  such  spoils  behind. 
This  large  number  of  technical  terms  is  certainly 
surprising.  Some  of  them,  as,  for  instance,  SuA:i, 
Pada,  Avadharita,  &c.,  are  not  mentioned  either  in 
the  Karikas  or  in  the  Sutras,  and  this,  which  has  been 
taken  for  a  sign  of  their  more  recent  date,  seems  to 
me,  on  the  contrary,  to  speak  in  favour  of  an  early 
and  independent  origin  of  the  Tattva-samasa  and  its 
commentary.  If  these  technical  terms  were  modern 
inventions,  they  would  occur  more  frequently  in 
modern  works  on  the  Sawkhya-philosophy,  but  as 
far  as  I  know,  they  do  not. 

Mftlikarthas. 

XVIII.  We  have  still  to  examine,  though  as  briefly 
as  possible,  the  Mulikarthas  or  eight  cardinal  facts, 
that  is,  the  most  important  subjects  established 
by  the  Sa»<khya  '.  They  are  with  regard  to 
PrakHti  or  Pradhana,  its  reality  (Astitva),  its 
oneness  (Ekatva),  its  having  an  object  or  an 

1  See  Samkhya-tattva-kaumudl,  p.  59. 


SHASim-TANTRA.  355 

intention  (Arthavattva),  and  its  being  intended  for 
some  one  else  (Pararthya).  They  are  with  regard 
to  Purusha  his  being  different  from  Prakn'ti  (An- 
yatva),  his  not  being  an  agent  (Akartritva),  and  his 
being  many  (Bahutva).  They  are  with  regard  to 
both  Prakriti  and  Purusha,  their  temporary  union 
and  separation,  while  Sthiti,  durability,  is  said  to 
refer  to  the  Sukshma-  and  Sthula-sarira,  the  gross 
and  the  subtle  bodies.  Astitva,  reality,  might  seem 
to  belong  to  both  PrakHti  and  Purusha,  but  it  is 
meant  as  the  reality  of  PrakHti  only,  which  the 
Samkhya  is  chiefly  concerned  with  establishing  as 
against  the  Vedantins  who  deny  it  with  regard  to 
all  that  is  objective,  keeping  it  for  the  subject 
only,  whether  he  is  called  Purusha  or  Atman.  The 
commentator,  however,  and  Prof.  Garbe  also,  connect 
Astitva  with  Purusha  as  well  as  with  PrakHti. 
The  matter  is  of  little  consequence,  unless  Astitva 
is  taken  in  the  sense  of  phenomenal  or  perceptible 
reality.  The  highest  reality  of  the  Purusha  or  the 
Atman  has  of  course  never  been  doubted  by  Sam- 
khya or  Vedanta  philosophers,  but  that  is  more 
than  mere  Astitva. 

Shashft-tantra. 

It  should  be  added  that  the  commentator  in  this 
place  accounts  once  more  for  the  name  of  Shashd- 
tantra,  the  Sixty-doctrine,  but  this  time  by  adding 
the  17  Tushes  and  Siddhis,  the  33  (Avidya  5 + 
Asakti  28)  and  10,  not  8,  Mulikarthas,  and  thus 
arriving  at  60  topics.  The  Chinese  name  presup- 
poses a  Saptati-sastra,  or  Seventy-treatise,  probably 
with  reference  to  the  original  number  of  verses  in 
the  Karika. 

A  a  2 


356  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Anugraha-sarga. 

XIX.  But  even  here  the  Tattva-samasa  is  not  yet 
finished,  for  it  goes  on  to  explain  the  Anugraha- 
sarga,    lit.    the    creation   of  benevolence,   which    is 
explained  as  the  production  of  external  objects  from 
the  five  Tanmatras  or  subtle  essences  for  the  sake 
of  the  Purusha.     Brahma,   after  seeing  these  (the 
organs   of  sense  ?)    produced,   but    as   yet  without 
a  sphere  in  which  their  measuring   or  perceiving 
power   could    find    scope,    created    for    them    the 
so-called    benevolent    creation,    shaped    from     the 
Tanmatras  \ 

Bhtita-sarga. 

XX.  After  this  follows  the  Bhuta-sarga  in  fourteen 
divisions.     The  divine  creation  has  eight  divisions, 
consisting  of  good  and  evil  spirits  and  gods,  such  as 
Pi.9a£as,  Rakshas,  Yakshas,  Gandharvas,  Indra,  Pra- 
grapati,  and  Brahma.      The  animated  creation  con- 
sists of  domestic  animals,  birds,  wild  animals,  reptiles, 
and  immovable  things  or  plants.    The  human  creation 
consists  of  one,  of  man  only,  from  Brahmans  down  to 
K&ndiil&s.     Domestic  animals  are   from  cows  down 
to  mice  ;  birds  from    Garur/a  down  to  gnats  ;  wild 
animals  from  lions  down  to  jackals  ;  reptiles   from 
Sesha  (world-serpent)  down  to  worms  ;    immovable 
things  from  the  Pari^ata-tree  (in  paradise)  down  to 
grass.     This  is  the  threefold  creation,  consisting  of 
gods,   men,    and    animals,    the    animals,    i.  e.   living 
beings,  forming   again   five  classes. 

1  Tliis  passage  is  very  doubtful,  unless  we  connect  Man  a 
with  Tanmatra,  and  take  measuring  in  the  sense  of  perceiving, 
so  that  the  creation  would  be  represented  as  made  for  man. 


DAKSHItfA-BONDAGE,    GIFTS    TO    PRIESTS.          357 

Bandha,  Bondage. 

XXI.  If  it  be  asked  what  the  threefold  bondage 
(Bandha)  consists  in,  it  is  replied,  In  the  eight  Pra- 
kritis,in  the  sixteen  Vikaras,  and  in  Dakshma  (gifts  to 
priests).  There  are  eight  Prakritis,  as  often  described 
before  (pp.  321,  329) ;  and  as  long  as  a  man  considers 
these  as  the  highest,  he  is  absorbed  in  PrakHti  and 
bound  by  Prakn'ti.  The  bondage  of  the  sixteen 
Vikaras  applies  both  to  ascetics  and  to  men  of  the 
world,  if  they  are  subdued  by  the  senses,  which  are 
Vikaras,  if  they  are  devoted  to  objects  of  sense,  if 
their  organs  of  sense  are  not  in  subjection,  if  they 
are  ignorant  and  deluded  by  passions. 

Dakshiwa-bondage,  Gifts  to  Priests. 
The  priestly  bondage  applies  to  those,  whether 
householders,  students,  mendicants  or  anchorets, 
whose  minds  are  overcome  by  passions  and  delusions, 
and  who  from  misconception  bestow  sacrificial  gifts 
on  priests.  A  verse  is  quoted  here  in  support  : 
*  Bondage  is  spoken  of  by  the  name  of  Prakriti- 
bondage,  Vikara-bondage,  and  thirdly  bondage 
through  priestly  gifts.'  This  last  bondage  seems 
to  me  very  important,  and  it  is  strange  that  it 
should  never  have  been  pointed  out  as  marking  the 
unecclesiastical  and  unorthodox  character  of  the 
Samkhya-philosophy  l.  What  would  have  become 
of  the  Brahmans  without  their  Dakshmas  or  fees, 
the  very  name  of  a  Brahman  being  Dakshimya,  one 
to  be  fee'd  ?  In  the  Aitareya-Brahmana  already  we 
readofYatis  who  condemned  sacrifices,  but  they  are 
said  to  have  been  thrown  to  the  jackals.  That  this 

1  See,  however,  Karika  44. 


35^  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

feeing  of  a  priest  should  have  been  considered  one 
of  the  three  bondages  shows  at  all  events  that 
the  followers  of  Kapila  were  above  superstition,  and 
looked  upon  sacrifice  and  priestcraft  as  hindrances 
rather  than  as  helps  to  true  freedom  and  Moksha  of 
the  spirit. 

Moksha. 

XXII.  This  Moksha,  the  highest  aim  of  Kapila's 
philosophy,  is  again  of  three  kinds,  according  as  it 
arises  from  increase  of  knowledge,  from  the  quieting 
of  the  passions  of  the   senses,  or  lastly  from  the 
destruction  of  the  whole.     From  increase  of  know- 
ledge and  quieting  of  the  passions  of  the   senses 
there  arises  the  destruction  of  all  that  is  commonly 
considered    as    merit    and    demerit ;    and    from    the 
destruction  of  merit  and  demerit  there  arises  final 
beatitude  consisting  in   complete  detachment  from 
the  world,  and  in  concentration  of  the  Purusha  in 

himself. 

Pramawas. 

XXIII.  The  three  Pramanas  which   follow  next 
require  little  explanation  here,  as  they  have  been 
fully  examined  before.   Still  each  system  of  philosophy 
takes  its  own   view  of  them,  and  the  character  of 
each  is  more  or  less  determined  by  the  view  taken 
of  the  real   nature  of  knowledge.      What   is   most 
creditable   is  that  each  system  should  have  recog- 
nised   the    importance   of  this    question,    as   a   pre- 
liminary  to   every   philosophy.      This   distinguishes 
Indian  philosophy  very  favourably  from  other  philo- 
sophies.     All  systems  of  philosophy  in  India  admit 
Pratyaksha  or  perception  of  the  senses  as  the  first 
of  Prama/^as.     The  Vedanta,  however,  looks   upon 
the  Veda  as  the  only  source  of  true  knowledge,  and 


DUJ7KHA.  359 

actually  applies  to  it  the  name  of  Pratyaksha.  The 
ordinary  three  or  six  Pramanas  of  the  Mimamsa 
would  apply  to  the  world  of  Avidya  or  nescience 
only,  never  to  the  true  world  of  Brahman.  See 
Vedanta-Sutras  II,  i,  14.  The  names  vary  some- 
times, but  the  meaning  is  the  same.  Sensuous 
perception,  if  it  is  meant  for  what  is  perceived, 
is  sometimes  called  Drish^am,  what  is  seen  ;  and 
instead  of  Veda  we  meet  with  >Sabda,  word,  and 
Apta-va&ana  (Samkhya),  right  affirmation.  Anu- 
mana,  inference,  is  illustrated  by  the  usual  examples, 
such  as,  inference  of  rain  from  the  rising  of  clouds, 
inference  of  water  from  the  appearance  of  cranes, 
inference  of  fire  from  the  rising  of  smoke.  What- 
ever cannot  be  proved  by  either  sense  or  inference 
has  to  be  accepted  as  Apta-va&ana,  as,  for  instance, 
the  existence  of  Iridra,  the  king  of  the  gods,  the 
Northern  Kurus,  Meru,  the  golden  mountain,  the 
Apsaras,  or  nymphs  of  Svarga,  &c.  For  all  these 
things,  Munis  such  as  Vasish^a  must  be  accepted 
as  authorities.  Apta  is  explained  as  a  name  for  a 
man  who  is  assiduous  in  his  work,  free  from  hatred 
arid  passion,  learned,  and  endowed  with  all  virtues, 
and  who  can  therefore  be  relied  upon.  These  three 
Prama?ias,  or  measures,  are  so  called  because  in  the 
same  way  as  in  common  life  grains  are  measured  by 
measures  such  as  a  Prastha,  and  sandal  wood,  &c., 
weighed  by  a  balance,  the  Tattvas  also,  the  principles, 
the  Bhavas  (their  modifications),  and  the  Bhutas, 
elemental  substances,  are  measured  or  proved  by  the 
Prama?ias. 

DuAkha. 

XXIV.  The  last  paragraph  in  the  Tattva-samasa 
points  back  to  the  first.   We  saw  in  the  beginning  how 


360  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

a  Brahman  was  introduced  who,  overcome  by  three- 
fold pain,  took  refuge  with  the  great  Jfo'shi  Kapila. 
If  we  ask  what  was  meant  by  that  threefold  pain, 
the  answer  is  that  it  is  Adhyatmika,  Adhibhautika, 
and  Adhidaivika.  Adhyatmika  is  pain  arising  from 
the  body,  whether  produced  by  wind,  bile,  or 
phlegm,  &c.,  and  from  the  mind  (Manas),  such  as 
is  due  to  desire,  anger,  greed,  folly,  envy,  separation 
from  what  is  liked,  union  with  what  is  disliked,  &c. 
Adhibhautika  is  pain  that  arises  from  other  living 
beings,  such  as  thieves,  cattle,  wild  beasts,  &c. 
Adhidaivika  is  pain  that  is  caused  by  divine  agents, 
as  pain  arising  from  cold,  heat,  wind,  rain,  thunder- 
bolts, &c.,  all  under  the  direction  of  the  Vedic 
Devas.  If  a  Brahman  is  affected  by  this  threefold 
pain,  a  desire  to  know  (the  reason)  arises  in  him,  as 
a  desire  for  water  arises  in  a  thirsty  man.  Freedom 
from  pain,  or  final  beatitude,  is  to  be  gained,  as  we 
are  told,  from  a  study  of  the  Tattva-samasa. 
Whoever  knows  the  philosophy  which  is  contained 
in  the  Tattva-samasa,  is  not  born  again.  This  is 
the  doctrine  of  the  great  sage  Kapila,  and  thus 
is  finished  the  commentary  on  the  Sutras  of  the 
Tattva-samasa. 

The  True  Meaning  of  the  Sawkhya. 

In  giving  an  account  of  the  Samkhya,  I  have 
followed  entirely  the  Tattva-samasa,  without  mixing 
it  up  with  the  Karikas  or  Sutras.  I  was  cpiite 
aware  that  the  Karikas  or  the  Sutras  might  have 
supplied  us  with  a  clearer  and  better -arranged 
account  of  that  philosophy.  But  if  I  am  right,  that 
the  Tattva-samasa  is  older  than  either,  it  seemed 
to  me  more  important  that  we  should  know  what 


NATURE    OF    PAIN.  361 

the  Samkhya  really  was  in  its  original  form.  By 
comparing  the  Tattva-samasa  with  the  Karikas  and 
Sutras,  we  can  easily  see  how  this  dry  system  was 
developed  in  later  times.  But  though  the  Karikas 
and  Sutras  give  us  a  more  systematic  account  of 
the  Sawkhya,  all  that  is  essential  can  be  found 
in  the  Samasa,  if  only  we  try  to  arrange  the  dry 
facts  for  ourselves.  It  must  be  confessed,  no  doubt, 
that  neither  in  the  Sutras,  the  Karikas,  nor  in  the 
Tattva-samasa,  do  we  find  what  we  most  value  in 
every  philosophy,  an  insight  into  the  mind  and 
heart  of  the  founder  of  that  philosophical  system. 
If  we  were  asked  why  such  a  system  should  ever 
have  been  imagined  and  elaborated,  or  what  kind 
of  comfort,  whether  intellectual  or  moral,  it  could 
have  afforded  to  any  human  being,  we  should  in- 
deed have  little  to  answer.  All  we  can  learn  is  that 
a  man  crushed  by  the  burden  of  what  is  called  the 
threefold  misery,  and  seeing  no  hope  of  relief  either 
by  means  of  good  actions  or  of  sacrifices,  which  can 
promise  no  more  than  a  temporary  happiness  on 
earth  or  in  Heaven,  should  seek  advice  from  a 
philosopher,  such  as  Kapila,  believing  that  he 
could  procure  for  him  entire  freedom  from  all 
his  troubles. 

Nature  of  Pain. 

Here  we  come  across  something  like  a  really 
human  sentiment.  We  can  well  understand  why 
pain,  not  only  as  actual  suffering,  but  as  an  appa- 
rent anomaly  or  imperfection  in  the  universe,  should 
have  opened  man's  eyes  to  the  fact  that  there 
was  something  wrong  or  limited  in  his  nature,  and 
in  the  world  in  which  he  found  himself;  and  it  is 


362  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

quite  intelligible  that  this  consciousness  of  his 
limitation  should  have  acted  as  the  first  impulse  to 
an  inquiry  for  the  cause  of  it.  This  would  naturally 
lead  on  either  to  a  religious  or  to  a  philosophical 
solution,  and  it  certainly  did  so  in  India.  A  religion 
must  have  existed  already  before  this  question  of  the 
origin  of  suffering  could  well  have  been  mooted  :  but 
religion  seems  rather  to  have  increased  the  difficulty 
of  the  questioner  than  solved  it.  The  gods  or  god, 
even  in  their  imperfect  conception,  were  generally 
supposed  to  be  good  and  just.  How  then  could 
they  be  the  authors  of  human  suffering,  particularly 
of  that  suffering,  bodily  or  mental,  for  which  the 
individual  was  clearly  not  responsible,  such  as  being 
1  born  blind,  or  deaf,  or  dumb,  or  mad.'  This  seems 
to  have  been  keenly  felt  by  the  ancient  Indian 
philosophers,  who  shrink  from  charging  any  divine 
power  with  injustice  or  cruelty  towards  men,  how- 
ever low  an  opinion  they  may  otherwise  have  formed 
of  Indra  and  Agni,  nay  even  of  Prar/apati,  Visva- 
karman  or  Brahma. 

Here  then  it  was  that  philosophy  was  called  in, 
nay  was  first  brought  to  life,  and  the  answer  which 
it  gave  as  to  the  origin  of  suffering  or,  in  a  wider 
sense,  the  origin  of  evil,  was  that  all  that  seemed 
wrong  in  the  world  must  have  been  the  effect  of 
causes,  of  deeds  done,  if  not  in  this,  then  in  a  former 
life.  No  deed  (Karman)  good  or  bad,  small  or 
great,  could  ever  be  without  its  effect,  its  reward 
or  punishment.  This  was  the  fundamental  principle 
of  their  ethics,  and  an  excellent  principle  it  was. 
Jt  was  but  another  version  of  what  we  mean  by 
eternal  punishment,  without  which  the  world  would 
fall  to  pieces  ;  for  it  has  rightly  been  observed  that 


NATURE    OF    PAIN.  363 

eternal  punishment  is  in  reality  but  another  name 
for  eternal  love.  This  idea  of  eternal  love,  however, 
cannot  hang  in  the  air,  it  presupposes  an  eternal 
lover,  a  personal  God,  a  creator  and  ruler  of  the 
world  :  but  even  this  idea  Indian  philosophers  would 
not  have  taken  for  granted.  In  some  cases,  though 
allowing  deeds  to  have  their  effects,  they  went  so 
far  as  to  admit  at  least  the  superintending  care 
of  a  Divine  Being,  just  as  the  giver  of  rain  enables 
seeds  to  grow,  though  the  seeds  themselves  were 
the  deeds  performed  by  men,  as  independent  actors, 
and  therefore  liable  to  take  all  their  consequences 
upon  themselves,  whether  good  or  evil. 

But  though  this  ought  to  have  sufficed  to  convince 
men  that  the  world  was  exactly  as  it  ought  to  be, 
and  could  not  have  been  otherwise,  because  man 
himself  had  made  it  what  it  was,  whether  as  an 
individual  or  as  a  member  of  a  class,  there  arose 
a  new  question  which  could  not  well  be  suppressed, 
namely,  Whether  it  was  beyond  the  power  of  man 
ever  to  put  an  end  to  the  unbroken  and  irresistible 
sequence  of  the  effects  of  the  deeds  of  himself  and 
of  his  fellow  creatures  ;  whether,  in  fact,  the  cycle  of 
life  and  death,  or  what  was  called  Samsara,  would 
go  on  for  ever.  And  here  the  bold  answer  was, 
Yes,  the  Samsara  can  be  stopped,  man's  former 
acts  can  be  shaken  off  and  annihilated,  but  by  one 
means  only,  by  means  of  knowledge  or  philosophy. 
In  order  to  achieve  this  deliverance  from  all  suffering, 
from  all  limitation,  from  all  the  bondage  of  the 
world,  man  must  learn  what  he  really  is.  He  must 
learn  that  he  is  not  the  body,  for  the  body  decays  and 
dies,  and  with  it  all  bodily  sufferings  might  seem  to 
end.  But  this  is  again  denied,  because  through  an  in- 


364  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

visible  agency  (Adnshtfa  or  Apurva)  a  new  Ego  would 
spring  up,  liable  to  suffer  for  its  former  acts,  just  as 
it  was  in  this  life.  A  man  must  learn  therefore  that 
he  is  not  even  what  is  meant  by  the  Ego,  for  the 
Ego  also  has  been  formed  by  surroundings  or  cir- 
cumstances, and  will  vanish  again  like  everything 
else.  Then  what  remains  ?  There  remains  behind  the 
body,  and  behind  the  Ego,  or  the  individual  person, 
what  is  called  the  Purusha  or  the  Atman,  the  Self, 
and  that  Self  is  to  be  recognised  either  as  identical 
with  what  was  in  earlier  times  conceived  and  called 
the  Divine,  the  Eternal,  the  Unconditioned,  namely, 
Brahman,  or  as  Purusha,  perfect,  independent,  and 
absolute  in  itself,  blissful  in  its  independence  and  in 
the  complete  aloofness  from  everything  else.  The 
former  was,  as  we  saw,  the  view  of  the  Vedanta, 
the  latter  is  the  view  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy. 
Both  may  have  had  the  same  roots,  but  they  differ 
in  their  later  growth.  The  view  which  the  Vedanta 
took  of  man  has  sometimes  been  mistaken  for  human 
apotheosis.  But  people  forget  that  for  these  philo- 
sophers there  were  no  theoi  left  whose  company  man 
could  have  joined,  and  whose  eminence  they  could 
have  reached.  The  Divine  which  they  meant  was 
the  Divine  in  man,  and  what  they  wanted  was 
reconciliation  between  the  Divine  within  and  the 
Divine  without.  Their  Moksha  or  Nirvana  was  not 
meant  for  Vergotterung,  not  even  for  the  Vergottung 
of  Eckhart ;  it  was  meant  for  complete  freedom, 
freedom  from  all  conditions  and  limitations,  self- 
clom,  in  fact,  whether  as  recovery  of  the  Divine  as 
Brahman,  or  as  Atman,  or  as  something  beyond  all 
names  that  had  ever  been  given  to  the  Divine,  as 
the  eternal  Subject,  undetermined  by  any  qualities, 


NATUKE    OF    PAIN.  365 

satisfied  and  blissful  in  his  own  being  and  in  his 
own  thinking. 

Whatever  we  may  think  of  these  two  solutions 
of  the  world's  great  riddle,  we  cannot  but  admire 
their  originality  and  their  daring,  particularly  if  we 
compare  them  with  the  solutions  proposed  by  other 
philosophers,  whether  of  ancient  or  modern  times. 
None  of  them  seems  to  me  to  have  so  completely 
realised  what  may  be  called  the  idea  of  the  soul 
as  the  Phoenix,  consumed  by  the  fire  of  thought 
and  rising  from  his  own  ashes,  soaring  towards 
regions  which  are  more  real  than  anything  that  can 
be  called  real  in  this  life.  Such  views  cannot  be 
criticised  as  we  criticise  ordinary  systems  of  religion 
or  morality.  They  are  visions,  if  you  like,  but  they 
are  visions  which,  to  have  seen  is  like  having 
been  admitted  to  the  vision  of  another  world ;  of 
a  world  that  must  exist,  however  different  in  its 
eternal  silence  from  what  we  and  from  what  the 
ancient  seers  of  India  imagined  it  to  be. 

The  most  curious  thing  is  that  such  views  could 
be  held  by  the  philosophers  of  India  without 
bringing  them  into  conflict  with  the  representatives 
of  the  ancient  religion  of  the  country.  It  is  true 
that  the  Samkhya-philosophy  was  accused  of  atheism, 
but  that  atheism  was  very  different  from  what  we 
mean  by  it.  It  was  the  negation  of  the  necessity 
of  admitting  an  active  or  limited  personal  god,  and 
hence  was  carefully  distinguished  in  India  from  the 
atheism  of  the  Nastikas  or  nihilists,  who  denied 
the  existence  of  anything  transcendent,  of  anything 
beyond  our  bodily  senses,  of  anything  divine.  To 
call  the  Samkhya  atheistic,  and  the  Vedanta  not, 
would  be  philosophically  most  unfair,  and  it  does 


366  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  Indian  priesthood  great  credit  that  they  treated 
both  systems  as  orthodox,  or  at  all  events  as  not 
prohibited,  provided  always  that  the  students  had, 
by  a  previous  severe  discipline,  acquired  the  strength 
and  fitness  necessary  for  so  arduous  a  task. 

How  different  the  world  of  thought  in  India  was 
from  our  own,  we  may  see  by  an  extraordinary 
defence  set  up  for  the  so-called  atheism  of  the 
Samkhya-philosophy.  It  seems  to  us  perfectly 
absurd,  but  it  was  by  no  means  so,  if  we  consider 
the  popular  superstitions  of  the  Hindus  at  the  time. 
It  was  a  common  belief  in  India  that  man  could,  by 
severe  penance,  raise  himself  to  the  status  of  a  god, 
or  Deva.  There  are  ever  so  many  legends  to  that 
effect.  This  might  no  doubt  be  called  apotheosis ; 
and  it  was  expressly  stated  that  it  was  in  order 
to  put  an  end  to  such  vain  desires  of  becoming 
personal  gods  that  Kapila  ignored  or  left  out  of 
question  the  existence  of  such  theomorphic  or 
anthropomorphic  beings  as  could  ever  excite  the 
rivalry  of  men.  We  are  hardly  prepared  for  such 
explanations,  and  yet  in  India  they  seem  quite 
'bond  fide. 

Vedanta  and  Samkhya. 

We  have  thus  finished  our  account  of  the  Vedanta 
and  of  the  Sa?>ikhya-philosophy.  At  first  sight  no  two 
philosophies  would  seem  to  be  so  different  from  each 
other,  nay,  to  start  from  such  opposite  points  of  view 
as  the  Vedanta  and  the  Samkhya.  The  Vedantist  of 
the  school  of  /Sa?>zkara  looks  upon  the  whole  world, 
including  animate  and  inanimate  nature,  including 
the  small  gods  and  the  still  smaller  men,  as  a  pheno- 
menal manifestation  of  an  unknown  power  which  he 
calls  Brahman.  There  is  nothing  beside  it,  nothing 


VEDANTA,    AVIDYA,    AND    AVIVEKA.  367 

that  can  be  called  real  except  this  one  invisible 
Brahman.  Then  came  the  question,  But  whence 
this  phenomenal  world  ?  or  rather,  as  he  starts  with 
the  idea  of  there  being  but  one  real  being  from 
eternity  to  eternity,  How  could  that  eternal  Brahman 
ever  give  rise  to  the  world,  not  only  as  its  efficient, 
but  also  as  its  material  cause,  if  indeed  there  is  any- 
thing material  in  the  objects  known  to  the  Vedantist? 
Under  the  circumstances  thus  given,  but  one  answer 
is  possible,  That  Brahman  is  the  world,  and  that  the 
world,  so  far  as  it  is  Brahman,  but  so  far  only,  is 
real.  The  phenomenal  world,  such  as  we  see  it  and 
live  in  it,  is  changeful,  ever  passing  away,  and  con- 
sequently never,  in  the  Vedantic  sense  of  that  word, 
real.  We  never  see  it  or  know  it,  as  it  really  is,  until 
we  have  become  Ved^ntists.  It  is  impossible  to  think 
that  this  eternal  Being,  whatever  name  be  given  to 
it,  could  ever  change  or  be  changed.  This  view  of  the 
universe  as  a  development  of  Brahman  was  possibly 
the  original  view  taken  by  Badaraya?ia,  and  it  was 
clearly  that  of  Ramanu^a  and  his  followers,  who 
explain  the  world  as  an  evolution  (Pari/iama).  But 
this  was  not  $amkara's  theory.  He  accepts  the 
two  facts  that  the  world  is  changing  and  unreal, 
and  yet  that  the  real  cause  of  it,  that  is,  Brahman, 
is  incapable  of  change. 

Vedanta,  Avidya,  and  Aviveka. 

Hence  nothing  remains  but  to  ascribe  the  change- 
ful phenomenal  character  of  the  world  to  something 
else,  and,  according  to  the  Vedanta,  to  ignorance,  not. 
however,  to  our  individual  ignorance,  but  to  some 
primeval  ignorance  directed  towards  Brahman  as 
manifested  and  seen.  This  ignorance  or  Avidya, 


368  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

again,  is  not  to  be  called  real,  it  is  nothing  by  the 
side  of  Brahman,  nothing  therefore  that  could  ever 
have  dominion  over  Brahman.  All  such  views  are 
excluded  by  the  postulate  that  Brahman  is  free,  is  one 
and  all ;  though  here  again,  other  Vedantists  differ 
from  $a?»kara,  and  represent  Avidy&  as  an  actual 
power  (/Siakti)  of  Brahman,  or  as  Maya,  i.  e.  illusive 
power,  which  in  fact  performs,  or  is  answerable  for 
what  we  call  creation.  We  should  of  course  ask  at 
once,  Whence  comes  that  Avidy&  or  that  Maya,  and 
what  is  it  ?  How  can  it  be  anything,  if  not  again 
Brahman,  the  only  thing  that  exists  ?  The  answer 
given  by  $amkara,  which  satisfied  his  mind,  if  not 
the  minds  of  other  Vedantists,  was  that  we  know 
as  a  fact  that  Avidy4  or  Nescience  is  there,  but 
we  also  know  that  it  is  not  there,  as  soon  as  we 
see  through  it,  in  fact,  as  soon  as  we  are  able 
to  annihilate  it  by  Vidya  or  knowledge,  such  as 
is  given  to  us  by  the  Vedanta-philosophy.  The 
Vedantist  holds  that  nothing  that  can  be  annihi- 
lated can  claim  true  reality  for  itself.  Therefore 
Avidya,  though  it  is,  must  not  be  called  something 
real.  The  great  difficulty  how  Brahman  could 
ever  be  affected  by  Avidya,  which  is  a  weakness  or 
a  defect,  is  avoided  by  looking  upon  Brahman,  while 
affected  by  Avidya  or  seen  through  Avidya,  as  for 
the  time  under  a  cloud  or  forgetful  of  itself,  but 
never  really  unreal.  We  ourselves  also,  that  is  the 
individual  souls,  can  be  in  full  reality  nothing  but 
Brahman,  though  for  a  while  we  are  divided  from 

7  O 

it,  because  forgetful  of  Brahman  through  Avidya. 
While  that  state  of  Avidya  lasts  the  true  Brahman, 
neuter,  may  become  to  us  Brahma,  masculine,  may 
become  the  creator  and  ruler  of  the  world,  and,  as 


SAMKHYA,    AVIVEKA.  369 

such,  receive  worship  from  his  creatures.  But  as 
soon  as  the  cloud  of.  Avidya  is  lifted,  this  creator 
also  recedes  and  is  restored  at  once  to  his  true  state 
and  dignity.  He,  the  so-called  Isvara,  or  Lord,  or 
Creator,  becomes  what  he  is  and  always  has  been, 
the  whole  Brahman  ;  and  we  ourselves  also  remember 
and  thereby  recover  our  true  Brahmahood,  or  Self- 
hood, not  as  if  we  had  ever  been  divided  from  it,  but 
only  as  having  been  blinded  for  a  while  by  Avidy& 
so  as  to  forget  ourselves,  our  true  Self,  that  is 
Brahman. 

Sawkhya,  Aviveka. 

The  Samkhya  takes  what  seems  a  very  different 
attitude  towards  the  problem  of  the  world.  These 
attitudes  towards  the  world  form  indeed  the  kernel 
of  every  philosophy.  If  we  call  the  Vedanta  monistic, 
the  Samkhya  is  decidedly  dualistic.  It  accepts  the 
whole  objective  universe  as  real,  and  calls  it  Pra- 
knti,  a  word  often  translated  by  Nature,  but  in 
reality  untranslatable,  because  the  idea  which  it 
represents  has  never  arisen  in  our  philosophy. 
PrakHti  may  be  called  the  undeveloped  matter 
or  Urstoff,  containing  in  itself  the  possibilities  of  all 
things.  By  itself  it  has  no  consciousness,  it  simply 
grows  or  develops  into  consciousness  when  seen  by 
Purusha.  And  it  develops  not  only  into  an  objective 
or  material  world,  but  at  the  same  time,  into  what 
we  should  call  the  subjective  or  intellectual  world, 
supplying  the  instruments  of  perception  and  thought, 
both  what  perceives  and  what  is  perceived.  The 
question  whence  it  came  is  never  asked,  as  little  as 
we  could  ask  that  question  with  regard  to  Brahman. 
It  is,  it  has  been,  and  it  has  had  no  beginning.  But 
in  order  to  account  for  the  world  of  experience,  it 

Bb 


370  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

is  supposed  that  this  undeveloped  PrakHti  is  always 
operative,  so  long  as  it  is  noticed  or  perceived  by  a 
Purusha  (Self),  and  always  passing  through  a  pro- 
cess of  evolution.  This  is  an  important  condition. 
Praknti  is  at  work  so  long  only  as  it  is  perceived 
by  a  Purusha  or  a  true  Self.  This  would  come  very 
near  to  the  recognition  of  the  subjectivity  of  all 
our  knowledge,  and  to  the  recognition  that  the 
world  exists  for  us  in  the  form  of  knowledge  only. 
If  we  call  Prak?^'ti  matter,  the  Samkhya  philosopher 
saw  clearly  enough  that  dead,  dull,  inert  matter 
alone  would  not  account  for  the  world.  Therefore 
he  makes  Prak?-iti,  under  the  eye  of  a  Purusha, 
develop  into  Buddhi,  commonly  translated  by  per- 
ception, but  really  a  kind  of  perception  that 
involves  something  like  what  we  should  call  in- 
tellect (rouy).  What,  as  far  as  I  can  see,  is  really 
meant  by  Buddhi  in  this  place,  is  the  lighting 
up  of  Praknti  or  dull  matter  by  intelligence,  so 
as  to  render  it  perceptive,  and  also  perceptible. 
It  is  the  Indian  '  Let  there  be  light.'  In  this 
stage  Praknti  is  called  Mahat,  the  great,  possibly 
in  order  to  indicate  its  importance  in  the  great 
development  of  the  universe.  It  cannot  be  taken 
here  in  an  exclusively  psychological  sense,  though 
it  supplies,  no  doubt,  the  possibility  of  the  intelli- 
gence of  the  individual  also.  In  the  cosmical  sense 
the  development  of  the  world  is  often  spoken  of  as 
Samashfi,  in  the  psychological  sense,  and  as  applied 
to  each  individual  it  goes  by  the  name  of  Vyash^i. 
Thus  Vu//lfma-Bhikshu  (Sa?>tkhya-Sutras  I,  63)  re- 
marks :  As,  according  to  passages  of  Sruti  and 
Smriti,  such  as  (/fAand.  Up.  VI,  2,  3)  '  Let  me 
multiply  myself,  let  me  procreate,'  the  creation  of 


SAA/KHYA,    AVIVEKA.  371 

the  elements,  &c.,  is  preceded  by  Abhimana  (i.  e. 
Ahamkara  or  subjectivity),  it  follows  that  this 
Abhimana  is  really  the  cause  of  the  creation  of  the 
world,  as  preceded  by  an  activity  of  Buddhi,  i.e. 
the  cosmical  Buddhi,  and  not  simply  the  personal 
organ  of  deciding,  as  Buddhi  is  generally  explained 
when  part  of  the  individual  or  psychological  develop- 
ment. For  shortness  sake,  it  is  sometimes  said  that 
Abhimana  or  Ahamkara  is  the  cause  of  creation,  for 
in  the  end  all  the  Vikaras  or  evolutes  serve  one  and 
the  same  purpose.  Buddhi  exists  in  human  nature 
as  the  power  of  perception,  and  it  is  then,  though 
not  quite  correctly,  identified  with  Manas  or  Anta^- 
karana,  the  mental  activity  going  on  within  us, 
which  combines  and  regulates  the  impressions  of  the 
senses,  as  we  shall  see  hereafter.  But  as  a  cosmic 
force,  Buddhi  is  that  which  gives  light  as  the 
essential  condition  of  all  knowledge,  and  is  after- 
wards developed  into  the  senses,  the  powers  of  light 
and  thought,  two  ideas  often  comprehended  by  the 
root  Budh,  to  awaken  or  to  perceive.  Budh  means 
literally  to  awake.  And  as  a  sleeping  person  is  dull 
and  inert  to  the  world,  but  begins  to  perceive  as 
soon  as  he  is  awake,  Prakriti  also  is  inert  till  it  is 
awakened  (Pra-buddha),  and  thus  becomes  Buddhi, 
perceiving  or  perception. 

This  Buddhi,  however,  which,  as  we  must  always 
remember,  is  here  conceived  as  a  development  of 
Prakriti,  and  as,  as  yet,  neither  subjective  nor  objec- 
tive, requires  a  new  development  before  it  can  serve 
for  conscious  intellectual  work.  Perception,  according 
to  the  S4mkhya,  cannot  work  without  Ahamkara, 
literally  I-making  or  Egoism,  but  philosophically 
used  with  a  much  larger  meaning,  namely,  if  I  am 

B  b  2 


372  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

right,  as  that  which  produces  the  sense  of  subject, 
and  in  consequence  of  object  also.  Nature,  in  spite 
of  being  lighted  up  or  rendered  capable  of  perceiving 
and  being  perceived,  requires,  even  after  it  has 
reached  the  stage  of  Buddhi,  the  division  of  the 
whole  world,  that  is,  of  itself,  into  subject  and  object, 
before  any  real  perception  can  take  place.  Subjec- 
tivation,  therefore,  would  seem  to  be  the  nearest 
approach,  though  naturally  there  can  be  no  subjec- 
tivation  without  simultaneous  objectivation. 

After  this  development  of  Prakrit!  into  Buddhi, 
and  its  differentiation  as  subjective  and  objective, 
the  next  step  is  that  it  produces  the  Tanmatras,  the 
elements  of  the  senses  as  well  as  of  the  sense-objects, 
such  as  sight  and  light,  hearing  and  sound,  smelling 
and  odour,  tasting  and  savour,  feeling  and  touch.  All 
these,  the  faculties  as  well  as  the  corresponding 
qualities  of  sense-perception,  are  modifications  of  the 
same  Prakrit!,  and  therefore  in  one  sense  the  same 
thing,  only  viewed  from  different  points  of  view, 
as  we  should  say,  as  subjective  and  objective,  and 
as  changed  at  last  into  the  material  reality  of 
the  sentient  powers  on  one  side,  and  the  objective 
world  on  the  other.  Lastly,  all  this  development 
remains  without  real  consciousness,  till  it  attracts 
the  attention  of  some  Purusha,  Spirit  or  Self, 
who  by  becoming  conscious  of  Prakrit!  and  all  its 
works,  produces  what  is  the  only  reality  of  which 
we  have  any  conception,  the  phenomenal  reality  of 
a  self-conscious  soul.  ]  hope  I  have  understood  this 
train  of  thought  rightly,  but  there  is  much  that 
requires  fuller  light.  Does  Kapila  really  look  upon 
perception  and  thought  as  an  instrument,  ready 
made  by  Prakrit!  for  the  use  of  the  Purusha,  but 


SAJfKHYA,    AVIVEKA.  373 

remaining  inert,  like  a  telescope,  till  it  is  looked 
through  by  the  Purusha,  or  is  it  the  first  glance  of 
Purusha  at  Prakn'ti  in  its  state  of  Avyakta  or  chaos, 
that  gives  the  first  impulse  to  the  activity  of  PrakHti, 
which  impulse  is  generally  ascribed  to  the  working 
of  the  Gunas  ?  Much  may  be  said  for  either  view. 
I  do  not  feel  competent  to  pronounce  so  decided  an 
opinion  as  others  have  done  on  this  subject. 

If  the  Vedantist  explains  what  we  call  Creation  as 
the  result  of  Avidya  or  Nescience,  the  Samkhya  ex- 
plains it  by  the  temporary  union  bet  ween  Purusha  and 
Prak?^'ti.  This  union  is  said  to  arise  from  a  want  of 
discrimination  (Aviveka),  and  it  is  not  in  the  highest 
sense  a  real  union,  because  it  vanishes  again  by  dis- 
criminating knowledge  (Viveka),  nay,  it  is  actually 
said  to  have  the  one  object  only  of  evoking  at  last  in 
the  Purusha  a  revulsion,  and  in  the  end  a  clear  recog- 
nition of  his  complete  independence,  and  his  freedom 
from  PrakHti  (Karika  66).  Thus  the  creation  of  the 
phenomenal  world  and  our  position  in  the  phenomenal 
world  are  due  to  nescience  (Avidya)  with  the  Vedant- 
ist, but  to  a  want  of  discrimination  (Aviveka)  with  the 
Samkhya  philosopher  (S.  S.  1, 5  5),  and  this  want  of  dis- 
crimination is  actually  called  by  the  Vedantic  term 
of  Avidya  in  the  Yoga-Sutras  II,  24.  Where  then,  we 
may  well  ask,  is  the  difference  between  the  two  views 
of  the  universe  ?  There  is  a  difference  in  the  mode 
of  representation,  no  doubt,  but  in  the  end  both 
Vedanta  and  Sa?7ikhya  look  upon  what  we  call  reality 
as  the  result  of  a  temporary  error,  call  it  nescience, 
illusion,  want  of  discrimination,  or  anything  else.  If, 
therefore,  philosophers  like  Vi^wana-Bhikshu  recog- 
nised this  original  similarity  in  the  tendencies  both 
of  the  Vedanta  and  the  Samkhya,  it  is  hardly  fair  to 


374  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

blame  them  as  having  mixed  and  confounded  the 
two.  No  doubt  these  two  philosophies  diverged  in 
their  later  development,  but  they  started  with  the 
same  object  in  view,  and  they  advanced  for  a  time 
in  the  same  direction.  If  the  Vedantists  desired 
to  arrive  at  what  is  called  Atma-anatma-viveka, 
discrimination  between  Atman  and  Anatman,  the 
Sa??ikhyas  looked  forward  to  Prakr/ti-purusha-viveka, 
discrimination  between Purusha  and  Prak?'/ti.  Where 
then  is  the  difference  ?  If  their  later  defenders  forgot 
their  common  interest  and  laid  greater  stress  on  the 
points  of  difference  than  on  the  points  of  similarity 
between  them,  it  was  but  right  that  those  who  could 
see  deeper,  should  bring  to  light  whatever  features 
there  were  left  of  the  original  family  likeness  between 
the  two  philosophies. 

Atman  and  Purusha. 

Greater,  however,  than  the  difference  between 
Nescience,  Avidya,  and  want  of  discrimination,  Avi- 
veka,  as  the  causes  of  the  world,  according  to  Vedanta 
and  Sa??ikhya,  is  that  between  the  Brahman  of  the 
Vedanta,  and  the  many  Purushas  of  the  Sawkhya. 
According  to  $awkara  the  individual  souls  are  not, 
according  to  Kapila  they  are.  According  to  the 
former  there  is  in  reality  but  one  Atman  or  Self,  as 
it  were,  one  sun  reflected  in  the  countless  waves  of 
the  world-ocean  ;  according  to  the  latter  there  are 
many  Purushas,  as  many  as  there  are  divine,  human, 
animal,  and  vegetal  souls,  and  their  plurality  is 
conceived  as  eternal,  not  as  phenomenal  only.  On 
this  point,  therefore,  there  is  a  radical  difference  ; 
and  this  is  due,  as  it  seems  to  me,  to  a  want  of 
accurate  reasoning  on  the  part  of  the  Sii^khyas. 
Such  a  peculiarity  must  not  be  slurred  over  in  an 


ATMAN    AND    PURUSHA.  375 

account  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy,  but  it  is  fair  to 
point  out  what  the  reason  of  this  aberration  may 
have  been.  From  a  higher  point  of  view  the  Purusha 
of  Kapila  is  really  the  same  as  the  Brahman  or  the 
Atman  of  the  Vedanta,  the  absolute  subject.  It 
differs  only  in  that  the  Purusha  was  never  conceived 
as  the  material  cause  of  the  universe,  while  Brahman 
was,  though,  of  course,  with  the  important  proviso 
that  everything  material  was  due  to  Nescience. 
Apart  from  that,  if  the  Purusha  was  meant  as  abso- 
lute, as  eternal,  immortal,  and  unconditioned,  it  ought 
to  have  been  clear  to  Kapila  that  the  plurality  of  such 
a  Purusha  would  involve  its  being  limited,  determined 
or  conditioned,  and  would  render  the  character  of  it 
self-contradictory.  Kapila  has  certainly  brought  for- 
ward every  possible  argument  in  support  of  the 
plurality  of  individual  Purushas,  but  he  has  forgotten 
that  every  plurality  presupposes  an  original  unity, 
and  that  as  trees  in  the  last  resort  presuppose  the 
tree,  as  men  are  descended  from  man,  call  him  Adam 
or  Manu  or  any  other  name,  many  Purushas,  from 
a  metaphysical  point  of  view,  necessitate  the  admis- 
sion of  one  Purusha,  just  as  the  many  gods  had  to  be 
recognised  as  in  reality  the  One  God  without  a  second, 
and  at  last  as  mere  mistakes  of  Brahman.  In  this 
way  Vi^?7ana-Bhikshu  was  right  that  Kapila  did  not 
differ  so  much  from  Badarayana  as  it  would  seem, 
because,  if  the  Purushas  were  supposed  to  be  many, 
they  would  not  be  Purushas,  and  being  Purusha 
they  would  by  necessity  cease  to  be  many.  It  may 
be  said  that  this  is  going  beyond  Kapila,  but  surely 
we  have  a  right  to  do  so. 

It  is  necessary,  at  all  events,  that  we  should  see 
all  this  clearly,  just  as  Vi^nana-Bhikshu  and  other 


376  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

philosophers  saw  it  clearly,  in  order  to  perceive  the 
unity  that  underlies  the  apparent  diversity  in  the 
philosophy  of  India.  Nor  should  we  ever  forget  that 
our  philosophical  Sutras,  whatever  their  age,  whether 
of  the  fourteenth  century  A.  D.  or  the  fifth  century  B.  c., 
are  but  the  last  outcome  of  the  philosophical  activity 
of  a  whole  country,  and  that  we  are  entirely  ignorant 
of  their  historical  antecedents.  We  should  remember 
that  the  grammatical  Sutras  of  Pa?nni  are  contra- 
dicted again  and  again  by  grammatical  forms  which 
have  fortunately  been  preserved  to  us  in  the  earlier 
Brahmarcas  and  Mantras  of  the  Vedic  period.  We 
have  no  such  remnants  of  an  earlier  period  of  philo- 
sophy anterior  to  the  Sutras,  with  the  exception  of 
the  as  yet  unsystematised  Upanishads,  and  possibly 
of  some  of  the  more  ancient  parts  of  the  Mahabharata ; 
but  in  other  respects  we  are  left  without  any  earlier 
facts,  though  not  without  a  firm  conviction  that  such 
perfect  systems  as  we  find  in  the  Sutras  cannot 
have  sprung  up  in  a  day,  still  less  from  one  brain, 
but  that  they  must  have  passed  through  many 
changes  for  better  or  for  worse,  before  they  could 
assume  that  final  and  permanent  form  in  which 
they  are  now  presented  to  us  in  literature.  The 
Sutras  are,  in  fact,  the  final  outcome  of  ages  of 
inquiry  and  discussion. 

It  would  seem  then  to  follow  from  Vi^nana- 
Bhikshu's  remarks  that  in  India  a  philosopher  might 
at  one  and  the  same  time  have  been  a  follower  of 
the  Vedanta  as  well  as  of  the  Sa?>*khya,  if  he  could 
only  see  that,  where  the  two  follow  different  roads, 
they  started  nevertheless  from  the  same  point  and 
were  proceeding  towards  the  same  goal.  If  this  is 
seen  and  accepted  in  a  historical  spirit,  it  can  do 


ATMAN  AND  PURUSHA.  377 

no  harm,  though  no  doubt  there  is  danger  of  the 
distinctive  features  of  each  system  becoming  blurred, 
if  we  dwell  too  much  on  what  they  share  in  common 
or  on  what  they  may  have  shared  in  common  at 
an  earlier  period  of  their  growth.  In  one  respect 
Vi</Mna-Bhikshu,  to  mention  him  only,  has  certainly 
seen  more  rightly  by  not  resorting  at  once  to  the 
idea  that  actual  borrowing  must  have  taken  place, 
whenever  Vedanta  and  Samkhya  shared  the  same 
ideas.  We  should  always  remember  that  there 
must  have  been  a  period  of  unrestricted  growth  of 
philosophical  thought  in  ancient  India,  and  that 
during  that  period  philosophical  ideas,  whether  true 
or  false,  were  common  property  and  could  be  freely 
adopted  by  different  schools  of  philosophy.  It  was 
in  the  Sutras  that  these  schools  became  sterilised 
and  petrified. 

On  one  point  Vi^nana-Bhikshu  may  have  gone  too 
far,  yielding  to  a  temptation  which  does  not  exist 
for  us.  To  him  not  only  Vedanta  and  Samkhya,  but 
all  the  six  Darsanas  or  systems  of  philosophy  were 
orthodox,  they  were  all  Snm'ti,  though  not  $ruti. 
Hence  his  natural  desire  to  show  that  they  did  not 
on  any  essential  points  contradict  each  other.  After 
he  had  reconciled  to  his  own  satisfaction  the  con- 
flicting tenets  of  Vedanta  and  Samkhya,  and  had 
certainly,  at  least  to  my  mind,  succeeded  in  discover- 
ing the  common  background  of  both  of  them,  he 
attempted  to  do  the  same  for  the  Nyaya  and  Vaise- 
shika.  These  two,  as  he  says,  as  they  represent  the 
Self  as  endowed  with  qualities,  might  seem  to  be 
contradicted  by  the  Vedanta  and  Samkhya  which 
show  that  the  Self,  or  the  Purusha,  cannot  be  endowed 
with  qualities  ;  but  this  is  not  so.  Nyaya  and  Vaise- 


378  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

shika  are  intended,  as  he  thinks,  as  a  first  step  only 
towards  the  truth ;  and  though  they  admit  the  Self 
to  be  qualified  by  pain  and  joy,  they  teach  that  the 
Self  is  at  all  events  different  from  the  body.  This  is 
what  marks  the  first  advance  toward  a  right  under- 
standing of  the  Self,  not  only  as  different  from  the  body, 
but  as  unaffected  by  pain  and  joy,  as  neither  suffer- 
ing nor  enjoying,  as  neither  thinking  nor  acting  in 
any  way.  To  the  followers  of  the  Nyaya-philosophy 
also,  Brahman,  the  Absolute,  is  AnirvaA'aniya,  unde- 
finable  or  inexpressible.  The  full  light,  however,  of  the 
Sa?>ikhya-doctrine  might  dazzle  the  beginner,  and 
hence,  according  to  Vi^ftana-Bhikshu,  the  usefulness 
of  the  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika,  as  slowly  preparing  him 
for  the  acceptance  of  the  highest  truth.  There  does 
not,  however,  seem  to  be  any  ancient  evidence  to 
support  this  view  of  Vu/mma-Bhikshu's,  that  the 
Nyaya  and  Vai.seshika  were  intended  as  a  prepara- 
tion only,  still  less  that  they  existed  as  systems 
before  the  doctrines  of  the  Samkhya  began  to  in- 
fluence the  thinkers  of  India.  The  Sawkhya  is 
indeed  mentioned  in  the  Mahabharata  (XII,  1 1 1,  98) 
as  the  highest  truth,  but  the  other  systems  are 
never  represented  as  merely  preparations  for  it.  They 
present  themselves  as  independent  philosophies,  quite 
as  much  as  the  other  Darxanas  :  nor  do  I  remember 
any  passage  where  Gotama  and  Ka/<ada  themselves 
represent  their  teaching  as  a  mere  step  leading  to 
the  higher  knowledge  of  Vedanta  or  Sawkhya,  nor 
any  utterance  of  P>adaraya«a  or  Kapila  to  the  effect 
that  such  preparation  was  required. 

Origin  of  Avidyfi,. 

The  question  which    the   Sawkhya   may  seem   to 
have  left  unanswered,  but  which  is  really  unanswer- 


THE    SASTRA.  379 

able,  is,  How  this  Aviveka,  this  failure  of  Purusha  to 
recognise  himself  as  distinct  from  PrakHti,  could 
ever  have  arisen,  and  how  and  by  what  stages  the 
development  of  Prakr&ti  may  be  supposed  to  have 
taken  place  which  led  in  the  end  to  the  delusion 
of  Purusha  and  made  him  look  on  the  senses,  on  the 
Manas  (central  sense),  on  the  Aham  or  ego,  nay  on 
Buddhi  or  intellect,  on  everything,  in  fact,  within 
his  experience,  as  belonging  to  him,  as  his  own  ? 
What  Kapila  wishes  to  teach  is  that  nothing  is  in 
reality  his  own  or  belongs  to  him  except  his  Self,  or, 
as  he  calls  it,  the  Purusha.  Here  we  can  observe 
a  real  difference  between  Sawkhya  and  Vedanta. 
And  while  in  all  these  discussions  Badarayana  had 
only  to  appeal  to  the  Veda  in  support  of  any  one 
of  his  statements,  Kapila,  with  all  his  regard  for 
Aptava&ana,  had  evidently  meant  to  reason  out  his 
system  by  himself,  though  without  any  declared 
antagonism  to  the  Vedas.  Hence  the  Sutras  of 
Kapila  received  the  name  of  Manana-sastra,  institute 
of  reasoned  truth. 

The  Sastra. 

If  then  it  is  asked  how  Kapila  came  to  know 
anything  about  Prakriti  or  Urstoff  which,  as  super- 
intended by  Purusha,  is  said  to  stand  for  the  whole 
of  creation,  and  how  we  ourselves  can  know  any- 
thing about  its  various  developments,  beginning 
with  Buddhi  or  intellect,  and  going  on  from  Buddhi 
to  Ahamkara,  the  making  of  the  I  or  Ego,  or  sub- 
jectivity as  inseparable  from  objectivity,  and  from 
Ahamkara  to  the  Tanmatras  or  subtle  substances, 
&c.,  we  have  to  confess  with  the  author  of  the 
Samkhya-sara  (p.  1 6)  that  there  was  nothing  but  the 
$astra  itself  to  depend  on  in  support  of  what  may 


380  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

be  felt  to  be  very  crude  and  startling  assertions  l. 
$astra  sometimes  stands  for  Veda,  but  it  cannot 
well  be  taken  in  that  sense  here.  It  seems  rather 
to  point  to  the  existence  of  a  treatise,  such  as 
the  Sa?ftkhya-karika  or  the  original  text  of  the 
Samkhya- Sutras,  or  the  whole  body  of  Samkhya- 
philosophy,  as  handed  down  from  time  immemorial 
in  various  schools  in  India.  At  first  sight,  no  doubt, 
it  seems  strange  to  us  to  derive  Buddhi  or  Intellect 
from  PrakHti,  nature,  or  from  Avyakta,  the  unde- 
veloped. But  we  must  remember  that  all  these 
English  renderings  are  very  imperfect.  Prak?"iti  is 
very  different  from  nature  or  0i/o-i?,  though  there  is 
hardly  a  more  convenient  term  to  render  it  by. 
In  the  Samkhya-philosophy  Prakriti  is  a  postulated 
something  that  exists,  and  that  produces  every- 
thing without  being  itself  produced.  When  it  is 
called  Avyakta,  that  means  that  it  is,  at  first, 
chaotic,  undeveloped,  and  invisible. 

Development  of  Prakriti,  Cosmic. 
In  place  of  this  one  Prakriti  we  often  read  of 
eight  Prakrttis,  those  beginning  with  Buddhi  or  the 
Mahat  being  distinguished  as  produced  as  well  as 
producing,  while  the  first,  the  Avyakta,  is  producing 
only,  but  not  produced.  This  need  not  mean  more 
than  that  the  seven  modifications  (Vikaras)  and 


1  For  the  actual  succession  in  the  evolution  of  AhawkAra 
from  the  Mahat,  and  of  the  Mnh;it  from  Prakr/ti,  &c.,  the 
S'dstrn  alone,  we  are  told,  can  be  our  authority,  and  not  infer- 
ence, because  inference  can  only  lead  us  to  the  conclusion  that 
all  effects  must  have  a  cause,  while  there  is  no  inference  to 
prove  either  the  succession  beginning  with  the  elements,  or 
that  beginning  with  the  mind  in  the  way  in  which  the  Saw- 
khya-philosophy  teaches.  Then  what  is  meant  by  6astra  here  ? 


BETEOSPECT.  381 

forms  of  Prakn'ti  are  all  effects,  and  serve  again  as 
causes,  while  the  Avyakta  itself,  the  undeveloped 
Prakriti,  has  no  antecedent  cause,  but  serves  as  cause 
only  for  all  the  other  forms  of  PrakHti. 

Retrospect. 

After  going  through  the  long  list  of  topics  which 
form  the  elements  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy,  it 
may  be  well  to  try  to  give  a  more  general  view 
of  Kapila's  system.  Whether  we  begin  with  the 
beginning,  the  postulated  PrakHti,  or  with  the  end, 
the  phenomenal  world  as  reflected  by  the  Indriyas 
and  the  Manas,  it  is  but  natural  that  Kapila  should 
have  asked  himself  the  question  how  what  was  pos- 
tulated as  the  beginning,  the  undeveloped  PrakHti, 
could  account  for  all  that  was  to  follow,  or  how  all 
that  did  follow  could  be  traced  back  to  this  postu- 
lated Prakriti.  Given  the  undeveloped  PrakHti,  he 
imagined  that  it  was  due  to  the  disturbance  of  the 
equilibrium  of  its  three  constituents  (Gunas)  that  it 
was  first  awakened  to  life  and  light  or  thought,  to 
physical  and  intellectual  activity.  Some  such  impulse 
is  required  by  all  metaphysicians,  a  ir^rov  K.IVOVV. 
This  first  step  in  the  development  of  Prak?"iti,  this 
first  awakening  of  the  inert  substance,  is  conceived 
by  Kapila  as  Buddhi,  the  lighting  up,  and  hence, 
so  long  as  it  is  confined  to  PrakHti,  described  as 
Prakasa,  or  light,  the  chief  condition  of  all  per- 
ception. After  Praknti  has  thus  been  lighted  up 
and  become  Buddhi,  or  potential  perception,  another 
distinction  was  necessary  in  this  luminous  and  per- 
ceiving mass,  in  this  so-called  Mahat  or  Buddhi, 
namely,  the  differentiation  between  perceiver  and 
what  is  perceived,  between  subject  and  object.  This 


382  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

was  the  work  assigned,  I  believe,  to  Aha?ttkara,  which 
I  should  prefer  to  translate  by  subjectivation  (Snb- 
jectivirung,  Garbe)  rather  than  by  Ego  or  Egoism. 

This  step  from  Buddhi  to  Ahamkara  has  been 
compared  to  Des  Cartes'  Cogito  ergo  sum\  but  is  it 
not  rather  Sum,  ergo  cogito,  as  showing  that  being 
itself  would  be  impossible  unless  it  were  first  lighted 
up,  and  differentiated  into  subject  and  object,  that 
esse,  in  fact,  is  per  dpi,  or  even  percipere  ? 

When  the  evolution  of  the  Avyakta  has  gone  so 
far,  the  question  arises,  how  this  process  of  perception 
could  take  place,  how  perception  is  possible  subjec- 
tively, how  it  is  possible  objectively.  If  we  begin 
with  the  objective  side,  the  answer  of  Kapila  is  that 
there  must  be  Tanmatras  (This-only),  potential  per- 
ceptilnlia,  which  are  not  the  potentialities  of  every- 
thing in  general,  but  of  this  and  this  only(Tan-matra). 
These  five  potentialities  are  Sound,  Touch,  Odour, 
Light,  and  Taste.  They  are  not  yet  what  is  actually 
heard,  seen,  &c.,  nor  what  actually  hears  and  sees,  but 
they  contain  the  possibilities  of  both.  As  there  is  no 
hearing  without  sound,  the  Sawkhyas  seem  to  have 
argued,  neither  is  there  any  sound  without  hearing. 
But  there  is  in  the  Tanmatras  the  potentiality  of 
both.  Hence,  according  to  the  division  produced  by 
Ahamkara  into  subject  and  object,  the  five  Tan- 
matras are  realised  as  the  five  subjective  powers  of 
perception,  the  powers  of  hearing,  touching,  smelling, 
seeing,  and  tasting,  and  corresponding  to  them  as 
the  five  objects  of  sense,  the  objects  of  sound,  touch, 
odour,  sight,  and  taste.  In  their  final  form  the 
five  potential  Tanmatras  stand  before  us  in  their 

1  Duvies,  Hindu  Philosophy,  p.  18. 


RETKOSPECT.  383 

material  shape,  subjectively  as  ear,  skin,  nose,  eyes, 
and  tongue,  objectively  as  ether,  air,  light,  water, 
and  earth  (the  five  Mahabhutas).  These  five  supply 
all  possible  and  real  forms  under  which  perception 
can  and  does  take  place. 

It  should  be  remembered,  however,  that  in  order  to 
account  for  perception  such  as  it  really  is,  another, 
a  sixth  sense,  is  necessary,  in  addition  to  the  five, 
which  is  called  Manas,  generally  translated  by  mind, 
but  really  a  kind  of  central  organ  of  perception, 
acting  as  a  door-keeper,  meant  to  prevent  the 
crowding  in  of  perceptions,  to  arrange  them  into 
percepts,  and,  as  we  should  say,  into  concepts  also, 
being  in  fact  the  conditio  sine  qud  non  of  all  well- 
ordered  and  rational  thought.  One  might  feel  in- 
clined to  translate  Manas  by  brain,  if  brain  had  not 
become  so  unscientific  a  term  in  our  days.  It  might 
also  be  called  the  point  of  attention  and  appercep- 
tion, but  even  this  would  hardly  help  us  to  a  clear 
view  of  what  Kapila  really  meant  by  Manas.  Only 
we  must  guard  against  taking  this  Manas,  or  mind,  for 
the  true  Self.  Manas  is  as  much  a  mere  instrument 
of  knowledge  and  a  product  of  PrakHti  as  the  five 
senses.  They  all  are  necessary  for  the  work  of 
perception,  conception,  and  all  the  rest,  as  a  kind 
of  clockwork,  quite  different  from  the  highest  Self, 
whether  it  is  called  Atman  or  Purusha.  The  Purusha 
watches  the  clockwork,  and  is  for  a  time  misled  into 
believing  in  his  identity  with  the  workings  of  Prakriti. 

This  is  but  a  poor  attempt  to  make  the  Samkhya 
view  of  being  and  knowing  intelligible,  and  I  am 
far  from  maintaining  that  \ve  have  gained,  as  yet, 
a  full  insight  into  the  problems  which  troubled 
Kapila,  or  into  the  solutions  which  he  proposed. 


384  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

What  I  feel  is,  that  it  is  not  enough  simply  to 
repeat  the  watchwords  of  any  ancient  philosophy, 
which  are  easily  accessible  in  the  Sutras,  but  that 
we  must  at  least  make  an  attempt  to  bring  those 
ancient  problems  near  to  us,  to  make  them,  our  own, 
and  try  to  follow  the  ancient  thinkers  along  the  few 
footsteps  which  they  left  behind. 

There  is  an  illustration  in  the  Sawkhya-tattva- 
Kaumudi  36,  which  suggests  a  very  different  view 
of  the  process  of  knowing,  and  deserves  to  be  taken 
into  consideration :  'As  the  seniors  of  a  village,'  they 
say,  '  collect  taxes  from  the  householders  and  hand 
them  over  to  the  governor  of  the  district,  who 
again  remits  them  to  the  treasurer,  and  the  trea- 
surer to  the  king,  thus  do  the  outer  senses,  when 
they  have  perceived  anything,  hand  it  on  to  the 
inner  sense,  the  Manas,  the  organ  which  determines 
what  there  is  and  then  hands  it  over  to  Aha??ikara, 
and  the  Ahawkara,  after  appropriating  it,  to  the 
Buddhi,  the  supreme  Lord.'  Here  Buddhi,  though 
supreme,  is  decidedly  different  from  the  cosmic 
Buddhi  that  springs  from  the  Avyakta  and  leads 
to  Ahawikara  ;  nor  is  it  easy  to  see  how  these  two 
Buddhis,  or  rather  that  one  Buddhi  in  its  two  func- 
tions, could  have  been  admitted  by  one  and  the 
same  philosopher. 

Is  Sa?nkhya  Idealism  ? 

There  is  another  point  on  which  it  is  difficult  to 
come  to  a  clear  understanding.  We  are  asked 
whether  the  Hindus  fully  realised  the  fact  that  we 
are  conscious  of  our  sensations  only,  and  that  all 
we  call  bodies,  or  the  outside  or  objective  world,  is 
no  more  than  the  result  of  an  irresistible  inference 
of  our  mind,  which  may  be  called  Avidya.  We  are 


IS    SAAfKHYA    IDEALISM?  385 

conscious,  no  doubt,  that  we  are  not  ourselves  the 
cause  of  our  sensations,  that  we  do  not  make 
the  sky,  but  that  it  is  given  us.  But  beyond  that, 
our  world  is  only  an  inductive  world,  it  is,  so  to 
say,  our  creation  ;  we  make  the  sky  concave  or 
blue,  and  all  that  remains,  after  deducting  both 
the  primary  and  secondary  qualities,  is  PrakHti 
as  looked  at  by  Purusha,  or,  as  we  should  say,  das 
Ding  an  sich,  which  we  can  never  know  directly. 
It  is  within  us,  or  under  our  sway,  that  this 
PrakHti  has  grown  to  all  that  it  is,  not  excluding 
our  own  bodies,  our  senses,  our  Manas,  our  Tanmatras, 
our  Ahamkara,  our  Buddhi.  Was  this  the  view 
taken  by  the  Samkhyas  ?  Did  they  see  that  the 
Saft&ara,  the  development  of  the  world,  takes  place 
within  us,  is  our  growth,  though  not  our  work,  that 
the  light  which,  as  Buddhi  emerges  from  Prakriti,  is 
the  light  within  us  that  has  the  power  of  perceiving 
by  its  light ;  that  both  the  Aham,  the  Ego,  and  the 
Tvam,  the  Non-Ego,  determine  not  only  ourselves, 
but  the  whole  world,  and  that  what  we  call  the  real, 
the  sensuously  perceiving  and  perceived  world,  is  no 
more  than  the  development  of  thoughtless  nature 
as  reflected  through  the  senses  on  our  enchanted 
Self?  The  riddle  of  the  world  which  the  Samkhya- 
philosophy  has  to  solve  would  then  be  no  more  than 
to  account  for  the  mistaken  interest  which  the  Self 
takes  in  that  reflex,  the  consciousness  which  he 
assumes  of  it,  the  fundamental  error  by  which,  for 
a  time  at  least,  he  actually  identifies  himself  with 
those  images.  This  identifying  process  would,  from 
this  point  of  view,  really  take  the  place  of  what  we 
call  creation.  The  closing  of  the  mental  eyelids 
would  be  the  dropping  of  the  curtain  and  the  close 

c  c 


386  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  the  drama  of  the  world  ;  and  this  final  recogni- 
tion of  our  cosmic  misconception  would  lead  the 
Self  back  from  the  stage  of  the  world  to  himself, 
would  undo  all  creation,  and  put  an  end  to  that 
suffering  which  is  the  result  of  bondage  or  finiteness. 
It  sometimes  seems  to  me  as  if  such  views  had  been 
at  the  bottom  of  all  Hindu  philosophy,  though  for- 
gotten again  or  obscured  by  a  belief  in  that  reality 
which  determines  our  practical  life  (Vyavahara).  By 
admitting  this  blending  of  cosmic  and  psychological 
views,  much  in  the  Sa??ikhya-philosophy  would  cease 
to  be  obscure,  the  Buddhi  of  the  world  and  the 
Buddhi  of  ourselves  would  indeed  become  one,  and 
the  belief  in  the  reality  of  things,  both  objective 
and  subjective,  might  truly  be  explained  as  due  to 
Aviveka,  the  absence  of  discrimination  between  the 
Self  and  the  imagery  of  nature.  It  would  become 
intelligible  why  Prakn'ti  should  be  supposed  to  play 
her  part  so  long  only  as  it  was  noticed  by  Purusha ; 
it  would  explain  why  Prakn'ti,  by  itself,  was  taken 
as  A&etana,  objective,  thoughtless,  and  the  Purusha 
only  as  subjective,  conscious  and  thinking ;  why  in 
its  solitude  Purusha  was  conceived  as  not  active, 
but  Prakn'ti  as  always  active  ;  why  Purusha  should 
sometimes  mean  the  eternal  Self,  and  sometimes 
man  such  as  he  is  or  imagines  himself  to  be,  wrhile 
interested  in  the  world,  believing  in  the  world,  and 
yet  with  a  constant  longing  after  a  higher  and  truer 
state,  freedom  from  the  world,  freedom  from  pain, 
freedom  from  all  cosmic  being,  freedom  as  alone  with 

himself. 

Purusha  and  Prakr/ti. 

But  if  we  may  credit  the  founders  of  the  Samkhya, 
whether  Kapila  or  Asuri  or  Parl/rasikha,  with  such 


STATE    OF    PURUSHA,    WHEN    FREE.  387 

advanced  views,  if  they  really  had  made  it  quite 
clear  to  themselves  that  human  beings  cannot  have 
anything  but  their  own  knowledge,  we  can  under- 
stand why  they  should  have  represented  the  whole 
process  of  perception  and  combination,  all  joy  and 
pain,  and,  in  consequence,  all  willing  also,  as  belong- 
ing, not  to  the  Purusha  or  the  Self,  but  to  a  stranger, 
to  the  Manas,  and  indirectly  to  Prak?"iti,  while 
the  Purusha,  when  he  seems  to  see,  to  combine,  to 
rejoice,  to  suffer,  and  to  will,  does  so  by  misappre- 
hension only,  like  a  spectator  who  is  carried  away 
by  his  sympathies  for  Hecuba,  but  who  in  the  end 
dries  his  tears  and  stops  his  sighs,  leaves  the  theatre 
of  the  world,  and  breathes  the  fresh  air  of  a  bright 
night.  The  Samkhya  uses  this  very  simile.  The 
whole  development  of  PrakHti,  it  is  said,  takes 
place  only  when  Purusha  is  looking  on  the  dancer, 
that  is,  on  Prakrfti,  in  all  her  disguises.  If  he  does 
not  look,  she  does  not  dance  for  him,  and  as  soon 
as  he  turns  his  eyes  entirely  away  from  her,  she 
altogether  ceases  to  try  to  please  him.  She  may 
please  others  who  are  still  looking  at  her,  and  so  far 
it  may  be  said  that  she  is  never  annihilated,  because 
there  will  always  be  new  Purushas  to  be  enchanted 
and  enchained  for  awhile,  but  at  last  to  be  set 
free  by  her. 

State  of  Purusha,  when  Free. 

Often  has  the  question  been  asked,  What  then 
becomes  of  the  Purusha,  after  the  spell  of  Prakriti 
has  been  broken,  and  he  has  ceased  to  take  any  in- 
terest in  the  phantasmagoria  of  the  world,  thrown 
on  him  by  the  Manas  and  all  the  products  of  PrakHti 
that  support  the  Manas.  But  this  is  a  question 

c  c  2 


388  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

which  no  philosophy  can  be  expected  to  answer.  All 
that  can  be  said  is  that  Purusha,  freed  from  all 
PrakHtic  bonds,  whether  ignorance  or  knowledge, 
joy  or  sorrow,  would  remain  himself,  would  be  what 
he  alone  can  be,  unrestricted,  not  interfered  with, 
free  and  independent,  and  hence,  in  the  highest 
sense  of  the  word,  perfect  and  happy  in  himself. 
This  ineffable  state  of  bliss  has  naturally  shared  the 
fate  of  similar  conceptions,  such  as  the  oneness  with 
Brahman,  the  NiAsreyasa  or  Non  plus  ultra,  and 
the  Nirvana  of  the  Buddhists.  In  the  eyes  of  less 
advanced  thinkers,  this  unfathomable  bliss  assumed 
naturally  the  character  of  paradisiacal  happiness 
painted  in  the  most  brilliant  and  even  sensuous 
colours,  while  to  the  truly  enlightened  it  repre- 
sented tranquillity  (/Santi),  perfect  rest,  and  self- 
satisfaction.  While  I  agree  with  Dr.  Dahlmann  l 
that  the  Buddhist  idea  of  Nirvana  was  the  same, 
originally,  as  that  of  the  higher  bliss  of  the  Vedanta 
and  Sar/ikhya-philosophy,  I  cannot  believe  that  it 
was  borrowed  by  the  Buddhists  from  either  of  those 
systems.  Nirvana  was  one  of  the  ideas  that  were 
in  the  air  in  India,  and  it  was  worked  out  by 
Bud  dim  as  well  as  by  Kapila  and  Badaniyana,  but  by 
each  in  his  own  fashion.  The  name  itself,  like  many 
technical  terms  of  Buddha's  teaching,  was  no  doubt 
Brahmanic.  It  occurs  in  the  Vedanta,  though  it  is 
absent  in  the  Sa?/ikhya-Sutras.  We  see  in  the 
Buddhist  Suttas  how  it  was  used  by  the  Buddhists, 
at  first,  in  the  simple  sense  of  freedom  from  passion, 
but  was  developed  higher  and  higher,  till  in  the 

1  Nirvana,   eine  Studio  zur  Vorgeschichto  dos  Buddhismus 
von  Joseph  Dahlmann,  S.J.     Berlin,  1896. 


MEANING    OF    PAIN.  389 

end  it  became  altogether  negative.  If  it  had  been 
simply  taken  over  by  Buddha  from  some  individual 
teacher  of  an  established  philosophy,  it  would  betray 
its  origin,  while  we  see  it  spring  up  as  naturally  in 
Buddha's  philosophy  as  in  that  of  Badarayawa  and 
Kapila.  They  all  took  their  materials  from  the 
same  stratum  of  thought,  and  elaborated  them 
into  systems,  probably  about  the  same  time.  But  in 
spite  of  Dr.  Dahlmann's  very  learned  and  very  able 
pleading,  I  must  say  once  more  that  I  cannot  yet 
see  any  evidence  for  supposing  that  either  Buddha 
borrowed  direct  from  Kapila  or  that  Kapila  borrowed 
from  Buddha. 

Kapila  does  not  enter  into  a  minute  analysis  of 
his  Nirvana,  or,  as  he  calls  it,  Kaivalya,  aloneness. 
His  object  was  to  show  how  pain  arose  and  how  pain 
can  be  absolutely  removed.  If  freedom  from  limita- 
tion and  pain  is  happiness,  that  happiness  can  be 
secured  by  the  Samkhya  just  as  much  as  by  the 
Vedanta  and  the  Buddhist-philosophy;  but  though 
the  Vedantist  admits  happiness  (Ananda)  by  the 
side  of  existence  and  perception  (Sa&-/;it),  as  peculiar 
to  the  highest  Brahman,  he  does  not  attempt  to 
explain  what  kind  of  happiness  he  means  ;  and  some 
Vedanta  philosophers  have  actually  objected  to 
Ananda  or  happiness  as  a  positive  predicate  of  the 
highest  Brahman.  Negatively,  however,  this  happi- 
ness may  surely  be  defined  as  freedom  from  pain,  free- 
dom from  all  limits  or  fetters,  and  therefore  perfect 
bliss. 

Meaning  of  Pain. 

It  would  seem  extraordinary,  and  wholly  unworthy 
of  a  great  philosopher,  if  Kapila  had  had  eyes  for 
the  ordinary  sufferings  only  which  are  entailed  on 


390  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

all  the  sons  of  men.  He  must  have  known  that  there 
is  happiness  also  for  them,  and  something  between 
suffering  and  happiness,  the  even  tenour  of  a  man's 
life.  Kapila  meant  something  else  by  pain.  He 
seems  to  have  felt  what  Schelling  felt,  that  sadness 
cleaves  to  all  finite  life,  but  that  is  very  different 
from  always  being  intent  on  getting  rid  of  the  suffer- 
ings inherent  in  life  on  earth.  Kapila  evidently  meant 
by  Du/^kha  or  pain  something  more  than  physical 
or  even  mental  suffering,  namely  the  consciousness 
of  being  conditioned,  limited,  or  fettered,  which  is 
inseparable  from  this  life.  But  whatever  suffering 
he  may  have  meant,  the  method  suggested  by  him 
for  its  removal  is  certainly  bold  and  decided.  All 
this  suffering,  he  tells  us,  is  not,  as  we  imagine,  our 
suffering.  Like  the  whole  evolution  of  PrakHti,  this 
suffering  also  belongs  to  PrakHti  and  not  to  our- 
selves, not  to  the  Purushas. 

Purusha. 

In  order  to  explain  the  world,  we  have  to  admit 
not  only  Prakriti,  rising  in  the  form  of  Buddhi, 
Ahawkara,  and  Manas  to  the  height  or  the  deptli 
of  individual  existence,  perception,  and  action, 
but  likewise  another  quite  independent  being,  the 
Purusha,  the  real  or  the  better  and  truer  Self,  and 
therefore  very  much  the  same  as  the  Atman  of  the 
Vedanta.  Both  Purusha  and  Atman,  it  should  be 
remembered,  are  absent  in  Buddha's  teaching,  and 
by  their  removal  the  idea  of  Nirvana  has  become 
almost  meaningless.  But  on  this  point  also  we 
must  wait  for  further  light. 

With  Kapila  the  Purusha  or  Self  always  remains, 
after  as  well  as  before  his  release.  It  is  true  he  is 


PRAK.R/TI    AN    AUTOMATON?  39! 

only  the  looker  on  of  all  that  takes  place  through 
Prakrtti,  looking  as  it  were  into  a  glass  in  which  all 
the  doings  of  Prakn'ti  are  mirrored.  For  a  time  by 
some  strange  want  of  discernment,  this  Purusha, 

o 

always  one  of  many  Purushas,  forgets  his  true  nature 
and  identifies  himself  with  this  image  of  PrakHti. 
He  imagines  therefore  that  he  himself  sees  and 
hears,  that  he  himself  suffers  and  rejoices,  that  he 
himself  is  an  I,  really  possessing  all  that  the  world 
offers  to  him,  and  unwilling  to  give  it  up  again, 
whether  in  life  or  in  death.  His  very  body,  how- 
ever, his  organs  of  sense,  nay  his  mind  and  his 
individuality,  are  neither  he,  nor  his  ;  and  if  he  can 
only  learn  the  wisdom  of  Kapila,  he  is  for  ever  above 
the  body,  above  all  sensation,  above  all  suffering. 
Nay  Prakriti  even,  which  has  no  soul,  but  acts  only 
as  impelled  by  her  nature  when  looked  at  by  Purusha, 
ceases  her  jugglery  as  soon  as  Purusha  turns  away. 

Prakrit!  an  Automaton? 

It  might  possibly  help  us  to  understand  the  rela- 
tion between  Purusha  and  Praknti  better,  if  we 
saw  in  Prakriti  an  automaton,  such  as  Des  Cartes 
described,  performing  all  the  functions  which  we 
consider  our  own  and  which  are  common  to  man 
and  animals,  as  in  fact  a  mere  mechanism,  and  if  we 
took  the  rational  soul,  the  Purusha,  as  the  chose 
pensante,  superadded  to  the  automaton.  It  was 
Professor  Huxley  who  showed  that,  as  a  consequence 
of  this  assumption,  all  our  mental  conditions  might 
be  regarded  as  simply  the  symbols  (Pratibimba)  in 
consciousness  of  the  changes  which  take  place  auto- 
matically in  the  organism.  In  the  same  way  all  the 
changes  of  PrakHti,  from  mere  sensation  to  con- 


392  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ceptual  thought,  might  be  taken  as  including  pain 
and  joy  and  consequent  action,  the  working  of 
PrakHti,  independent  of  the  looker  on,  although 
that  looker  on  in  his  enchanted  state  imagines  that 
he  is  himself  doing  what  in  reality  Prak?^'ti  is  doing 
for  him.  This  is  beautifully  illustrated  by  the  simile 
of  the  dancing-girl  to  which  we  referred  before,  but 
who  is  here  represented  not  only  as  intent  on  pleas- 
ing and  beguiling  Purusha,  but  as  trying  herself  to 
open  his  eyes  and  make  him  free  from  her  charms 
and  fetters.  We  thus  get  a  new  application  of  the 
simile  mentioned  before. 

Prakr/ti's  Unselfishness. 

We  read  in  the  Karikas  59-62  :  '  As  a  dancer 
having  exhibited  herself  on  the  stage  ceases  to  dance, 
so  does  Nature  (PrakHti)  cease,  when  she  has  made 
herself  manifest  to  Purusha. 

60.  In  many  ways  PrakHti  serves  Purusha,  who 
yet   does  nothing  for  her  in  return  ;    she   is   noble 
minded  and  cares  only  for  the  welfare  of  him  who 
is  so  ungrateful  to  her. 

6 1.  There  is  nothing  more  modest,  I  think,  than 
Prakriti,  who  does  not  expose  herself  again  to  the 
gaze  of  Purusha,  after  she  knows  that  she  has  been 
gazed  at. 

62.  No  Purusha  is  therefore  really  chained,  nor 
does   lie    become   free,   or   wander  ;    Praknti   alone, 
dependent  as  she  is  on  different  Purushas,  wanders 
from  birth  to  birth,  is  bound,  and  is  freed/ 

In  fact  it  would  seem  that  Praknti,  in  enchanting 
or  binding  Purusha,  has  no  object  in  view  except  that 
Purusha  should  in  the  end  perceive  his  fetters,  and 
by  discrimination  become  free  from  them  (Kurika  59). 


GROSS    AND    SUBTLE    BODY.  393 

Here  is  indeed  the  Gordian  knot  of  the  whole 
Samkhya-philosophy.  We  believe  for  a  time  in  our 
own  physical  nature  and  in  the  nature  by  which  we 
are  surrounded,  and  so  long  as  we  do  this,  we  suffer. 
We  are  exposed  to  all  kinds  of  pain,  till  our  eyes  are 
opened  and  we  learn  that  it  is  Prak?^'ti  that  sees 
and  acts,  that  kills  and  is  killed,  that  suffers,  while 
we  imagine  that  we  ourselves  do  and  suffer  all  this. 
As  soon  as  this  insight  has  been  gained,  as  soon  as 
Purusha  has  distinguished  between  himself  and  what 
is  not  himself,  liberation  is  achieved  at  once,  and  the 
dance  of  life  is  ended  for  ever,  at  least  so  far  as  the 
liberated  Self  is  concerned.  Until  that  final  liberation 
has  been  accomplished  and  everything  like  body  has 
been  completely  removed,  transmigration  continues, 
and  the  Purusha  is  supposed  to  be  clothed  in  what 
is  called  the  Liriga-sarira,  or  subtle  body.  Whatever 
we  may  think  of  the  truth  of  such  a  system  we  can- 
not help  admiring  its  consistency  throughout,  and  its 
boldness  and  heroism  in  cutting  the  Gordian  knot. 

Gross  and  Subtle  Body. 

The  idea  of  a  subtle  body  by  the  side  of  our 
gross  body  is  very  natural ;  and  we  know  that 
among  the  Greeks  also  Pythagoras  claimed  a  subtle 
ethereal  clothing  for  the  soul  apart  from  its  grosser 
clothing  when  united  with  the  body.  But  the  exact 
nature  of  that  subtle  body  and  its  relation  to  the 
grosser  body  is  by  no  means  as  clear  as  we  could 
wish  it  to  be. 

Both  Samkhyas  and  Vedantists  agreed  in  admit- 
ting the  necessity  of  a  subtle  body  in  order  to  make 
the  process  of  migration  after  death  intelligible. 
In  the  Vedanta  the  name  of  that  body,  or  vehicle, 


394  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

or  Asraya  for  the  journey  of  the  soul  from  existence 
to  existence  is  Sukshma-sarira,  the  subtle  body. 
The  Vedantists  look  upon  this  thin  and  transparent 
vehicle  of  the  soul  as  a  seminal  or  potential  (Vigra 
or  £akti)  body,  which  at  death  leaves  the  coarse 
material  body,  without  being  injured  itself.  This 
subtle  body  arises,  according  to  the  Vedanta,  from 
the  so-called  Upadhis  (conditions),  and  consists  of 
the  senses  of  the  body  (Dehendriyas),  both  percep- 
tive (Buddhindriyas)  and  active  (Karmendriyas),  and 
of  Manas  (mind),  of  Buddhi  (intellect),  Vedana  (sensa- 
tion), implying  beyond  itself  the  Vishayas,  objects 
required  for  sensation  and  presupposed  already  by 
Manas.  Its  physical  life  is  dependent  on  the  Mukhya 
Prana,  the  vital  spirit,  and  on  the  five  Pra/ias,  the 
specialised  spirits.  Its  Indriyas  or  senses  are  not 
to  be  taken  as  the  external  organs  of  sense,  such  as 
ears,  eyes,  &c.,  but  as  their  functions  only  (Vritti). 
This  subtle  and  invisible  body  or  Suksh ma-sarira 
remains,  according  to  the  Vedanta,  till  true  know- 
ledge arises,  and  the  individual  soul  recovers  its  true 
being  in  Brahman.  The  Vedantists  are,  however, 
by  no  means  consistent  in  their  views  on  these  two 
bodies,  the  subtle  and  the  coarse  body  (Sukshmaw 
and  Sthulam  $ariraw),  or  on  the  process  by  which 
the  one  affects  or  controls  the  other.  At  the  final 
dissolution  of  the  coarse  body  we  are  told  that  the 
Indriyas  are  absorbed  in  the  Manas,  the  Manas  In 
the  Mukhya  Prami.  this  in  the  (7iva,  the  individual, 
and  this  in  the  subtle  body  ;  but  neither  the  Upani- 
shads  nor  the  Vedanta-Sutras  are  always  quite 
consistent  and  clear  in  their  views  on  the  subject, 
;md  it  seems  to  me  useless  to  attempt  to  reduce 
their  various  guesses  to  one  uniform  theory. 


THE    ATHEISM    OF    KAPILA.  395 

In  the  Samkhya-philosophy  this  Sukshma-sarira 
appears  as  Linga-sarira,  or  the  sign-body.  The 
Sthula-sarira  or  coarse  material  body  consists,  accord- 
ing  to  some  Samkhya  teachers,  of  the  five  or  four 
coarse  elements  (Bhutas),  according  to  others  of  the 
element  of  the  earth  only,  and  is  made  up  of  six 
coverings,  hair,  blood,  flesh,  sinews,  bones  and  mar- 
row. The  subtle  or  inner  body,  sometimes  called 
the  vehicle,  or  the  Ativahika-sarira,  is  formed  of 
eighteen  elements1,  of  (i)  Buddhi,  (2)  Ahamkara, 
(3)  Manas,  (4-8)  the  five  Tanmatras  or  Sukshma- 
bhutas,  and  (9-18)  the  ten  senses.  This  body  is  of 
course  invisible,  but  without  it  the  coarse  body 
would  be  useless.  It  forms  what  we  should  call  our 
personality,  and  causes  the  difference  in  the  char- 
acters of  individuals,  being  itself  what  it  has  been 
made  to  be  by  former  works.  All  fitness  for  reward 
and  punishment  attaches  to  it,  not  to  the  Purushas 
who  are  all  alike  and  unchanging,  and  it  likewise 
determines  by  means  of  its  acquired  dispositions  the 
gross  bodies  into  which  it  has  to  enter  from  life  to 
life,  till  final  freedom  is  obtained  by  the  Purusha  ; 
and  not  only  the  gross  body,  but  the  subtle  body 
also  is  reabsorbed  in  Prakrit  i. 

The  Atheism  of  Kapila. 

We  have  still  to  say  a  few  words  about  the 
charge  of  atheism  brought  against  the  Samkhyas. 
It  seems  certainly  strange  that  at  this  early  time 

1  Karika  40,  and  Suwkhya-Sutras  III,  9.  Why  the  Linga- 
sarira  should  be  said  to  consist  of  seventeen  and  one  (Sapta- 
dasaikam)  elements,  is  difficult  to  say,  unless  Eka  is  taken  for 
the  Purusha  who,  for  the  time  being,  identifies  himself  with 
the  subtle  body. 


396  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  surrounded  as  he  no  doubt  was  by  sacrifices  and 
hymns  addressed  to  the  innumerable  Vedic  Devas, 
nothing  should  have  been  said  by  Kapila  either  for 
or  against  these  beings.  Most  likely  at  his  time  and 
before  his  time,  the  different  Devas  of  the  popular 
religion  had  already  been  eclipsed  in  the  minds  of 
thoughtful  people  by  one  Deity,  whether  Pra^apati, 
Visvakarman,  or  Brahman.  Both  Pra^apati  and 
BrahmS,  are  mentioned  in  the  Tattva-samasa- 
bhashya.  But  even  such  a  supreme  Deva  or  Adhi- 
deva  is  never  asserted  or  denied  by  Kapila.  There  is 
a  place  in  his  system  for  any  number  of  subordinate 
Devas,  but  there  is  none  for  God,  whether  as  the 
creator  or  as  the  ruler  of  all  things.  There  is  no 
direct  denial  of  such  a  being,  no  out-spoken  atheism 
in  that  sense,  but  there  is  simply  no  place  left  for 
him  in  the  system  of  the  world,  as  elaborated  by 
the  old  philosopher.  He  had,  in  fact,  put  nearly 
everything  that  belonged  to  God  into  Prakriti, 
only  that  this  Prakriti  is  taken  as  purely  objective, 
and  as  working  without  a  conscious  purpose,  unless 
when  looked  at  by  Purusha,  and  then  working,  as 
we  are  told,  for  his  benefit  only. 

This  has  sometimes  been  illustrated  by  what  must 
have  been  a  very  old  fable,  viz.  that  of  a  cripple 
who  could  not  walk,  meeting  another  cripple  who 
could  not  see.  As  they  could  not  live  by  them- 
selves, they  lived  together,  the  lame  one  mounting 
on  the  shoulders  of  the  blind  one.  Prakriti,  we 
are  told,  was  the  blind,  Purusha  the  lame  traveller. 

We  must  remember,  however,  that  Prakr/ti, 
though  blind,  is  always  conceived  as  real,  because 
the  Sawkhya-philosophy  looks  upon  every  thing  that 
is,  as  proceeding  out  of  something  that  is  real  (Sat- 


THE    ATHEISM    OF    KAPILA.  397 

karyavada).  Arid  here  we  see  again,  the  fundamental 
difference  between  the  Sa?nkhya  and  the  other  philo- 
sophies, as  Va&aspati-Misra  has  pointed  out  in  his 
commentary  on  the  Samkhya-karikd  9.  The  Buddhist 
takes  the  real  world  as  the  result  of  nothing,  the 
Vedantist  takes  the  unreal  world  as  proceeding  from 
something  real,  Naiyayika  and  Vaiseshika  derive 
what  does  not  yet  exist  from  what  does  exist,  while 
the  Samkhyas  derive  what  is  from  what  is l. 

If  it  be  asked  how  the  unconscious  Prakr&ti  began 
to  work  and  attract  the  attention  of  Purusha,  Kapila 
has  an  answer  ready.  The  Gu?ms,  he  says,  are  first 
in  a  state  of  equipoise,  but  as  soon  as  one  of  the 
three  preponderates,  there  is  tension,  and  Prakrit! 
enters  on  the  course  of  her  unceasing  labours,  be- 
ginning with  the  emanation  of  Buddhi,  and  ending 
with  the  last  of  the  twenty-four  Tattvas. 

There  is  this  difference  also  between  the  atheism  of 
Kapila  and  that  of  other  atheistic  systems  of  philo- 
sophy, that  Kapila  nowhere  puts  himself  into  a  hostile 
attitude  towards  the  Divine  idea.  He  nowhere 
denies  distinctly  the  existence  even  of  the  purely 
mythological  gods,  such  as  Indra,  which  is  strange 
indeed ;  nor  does  he  enter  on  any  arguments  to 
disprove  the  existence  of  one  only  God.  He  simply 
says — and  in  that  respect  he  does  not  differ  much 
from  Kant — that  there  are  no  logical  proofs  to  estab- 
lish that  existence,  but  neither  does  he  offer  any 
such  proofs  for  denying  it.  We  know  that  Kant, 
honest  thinker  as  he  was,  rejected  all  the  logical 
proofs  of  the  existence  of  Deity  as  insufficient,  and 
based  the  arguments  for  his  belief  in  God  on  purely 

1  Garbe,  Sawkhya-Philosophie,  p.  202. 


398  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ethical  grounds.  Though  we  have  no  right  to 
assume  anything  of  the  kind  with  regard  to  Kapila, 
when  brought  face  to  face  with  this  great  religious 
and  moral  problem,  the  existence  of  a  supreme  God, 
we  ought  to  mark  his  impartiality  and  the  entire 
absence,  in  the  whole  of  his  philosophy,  of  anything 
like  animus  against  a  belief  in  God.  The  Devas  he 
could  hardly  have  seriously  believed  in,  we  should 
say,  and  yet  he  spares  them  and  allows  them  to 
exist,  possibly  with  the  reservation  that  people,  in 
worshipping  them,  were  unconsciously  approaching 
the  true  Purusha.  We  should  not  forget  that  with 
many  people  atheism  meant,  and  means,  a  denial  of 
Devas  rather  than  the  denial  of  the  one,  only  God, 
the  First  Cause  of  the  world.  This  whole  question, 
however,  will  be  better  discussed  when  we  reach  the 
Yoga-philosophy  and  have  to  examine  the  argu- 
ments produced  by  Pata%ali  against  Kapila,  and 
in  support  of  the  admission  of  a  Supreme  Being, 
generally  called  Isvara,  the  Lord. 

Immorality  of  the  Sawkhya. 

It  has  also  been  said  that  Kapila's  system  is  not 
only  without  a  God,  but  likewise  without  any 
morality.  But  though  it  is  quite  true  that,  accord- 
ing to  Kapila,  Purusha  in  his  perfect  state  is  non- 
moral,  neither  merit  nor  demerit,  virtue  nor  vice, 
existing  any  longer  for  him,  he  is  certainly  not 
allowed  to  be  immoral.  The  Sawkhya,  like  the 
Vedanta  arid  other  systems  of  Indian  philosophy, 
implies  strong  moral  sentiment  in  the  belief  in 
Karman  (deed)  and  transmigration.  Kapila  also 
holds  that  deeds,  when  once  done,  can  never  cease, 
except  at  the  time  of  Moksha,  but  produce  effect 


SAMKHYA    PAKABLES.  399 

after  effect,  both  in  this  life  and  in  the  lives  to  come. 
This  is  one  of  the  unalterable  convictions  in  the 
Hindu  mind.  There  is,  besides  the  admission  of  virtue 
and  vice,  the  dispraise  of  passion  and  the  praise  of  dis- 
passion.  These  are  represented  as  forms  of  Buddhi, 
as  Rupas  or  Bhavas,  forms  or  states,  inhering  in 
Buddhi,  and  therefore  following  the  Liiiga-sarira 
from  birth  to  birth.  Nay,  it  is  distinctly  added  that 
going  upward  is  due  to  virtue,  going  downward  to 
vice,  so  that  virtue,  as  a  preliminary,  is  really  in- 
dispensable to  final  liberation.  It  may  be  true  that 
in  this  way  morality  is  reduced  to  mere  calculation 
of  consequences,  but  even  such  a  calculation,  which 
is  only  another  name  for  reasoning,  would  serve  as 
a  strong  incentive  to  morality.  Anyhow  there  is 
no  ground  for  saying  that  Kapila's  system  ignores 
ordinary  morality,  still  less  that  it  encourages  vice. 

Samkhya  Parables. 

There  is  one  more  feature  of  the  Samkhya  that 
deserves  to  be  mentioned,  because  it  is  not  found  in 
the  other  Indian  philosophies,  but  may  be  supposed 
to  have  suggested  to  the  Buddhists  their  method  of 
teaching  by  parables.  A  whole  chapter  of  the 
Sutras,  the  fourth,  is  assigned  to  a  collection  of 
stories,  each  of  which  is  meant  to  illustrate  some 
doctrine  of  Kapila's.  Some  are  very  much  to  the 
point,  and  they  can  be  appealed  to  by  one  word,  so  as 
to  recall  the  whole  lesson  which  they  were  meant  to 
teach.  The  first  is  meant  to  illustrate  the  complete 
change  that  comes  over  a  man  when  he  has  been 
taught  his  true  nature  by  means  of  the  Samkhya. 
'As  in  the  case  of  the  son  of  a  king.'  The  story 
which  follows  is  that  a  young  prince  who  was  born 


400  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

under  an  unlucky  star,  was  taken  out  of  his  capital 
and  brought  up  by  a  $abara,  a  kind  of  wild  man  of 
the  woods.  When  he  grew  up  he  naturally  thought 
that  he  himself  was  a  iSabara,  and  lived  accordingly. 
But  a  minister,  who  had  found  out  that  the  prince 
was  alive,  went  to  him  secretly  and  told  him  that 
he  was  the  son  of  the  king,  and  not  a  Sahara. 
At  once  the  prince  gave  up  the  idea  that  he  was  a 
savage,  believed  that  he  was  a  prince,  and  assumed 
a  truly  royal  bearing.  In  the  same  manner  a  man 
who  has  been  told  his  true  character  by  his  teacher, 
surrenders  the  idea  that  he  is  a  material  and  mortal 
being,  and  recovers  his  true  nature,  saying  '  As  a  son 
of  Brahman  I  am  nothing  but  Brahman,  and  not 
a  being  different  from  him  in  this  phenomenal 
world.' 

The  commentator  adds  an  extract  from  the 
Garuc/a-Purana  which  must  have  been  borrowed 
from  a  Sa?7^khya  source  : — 

'As  everything  that  is  made  of  gold  is  known 
as  gold,  if  even  from  one  small  piece  of  gold  one 
has  learnt  to  know  what  gold  is,  in  the  same  way 
from  knowing  God  the  whole  world  becomes  known. 

As  a  Brahman  possessed  by  an  evil  spirit,  imagines 
that  he  is  a  /Sudra,  but,  when  the  possession  is  over, 
knows  that  he  is  a  Brahman,  thus  the  soul,  pos- 
sessed by  Maya,  imagines  that  it  is  the  body,  but 
after  Maya  has  come  to  an  end,  it  knows  its  own 
true  being  again,  and  says,  I  am  a  Brahman.' 

The  seventh  illustration  is  'like  a  cut-off  hand,' 
and  is  meant  to  teach  that,  as  no  one  takes  his  hand 
a^ain  after  it  has  once  been  cut  off,  no  one  should 

o 

identify  himself  witli  anything  objective,  after  once 
having  surrendered  the  illusion  of  the  objective.  The 


SAMKHYA    PARABLES.  4<DI 

sixteenth,  to  which  I  called  attention  many  years 
ago  as  connected  with  old  Aryan  folklore,  is  meant 
to  teach  that  even  an  accidental  negligence  may 
be  fatal  to  our  reaching  the  highest  goal,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  '  frog-wife.' 

The  story  is  that  of  a  king  who,  while  hunting, 
had  seen  a  beautiful  girl  in  a  forest.  She  became 
his  wife  on  condition  that  he  should  never  let  her 
see  water.  He  gave  the  promise,  but  once  when 
the  queen,  tired  after  playing,  asked  him  for  some 
water,  he  forgot  his  promise,  and  brought  her  some, 
whereupon  the  daughter  of  the  frog-king  became 
a  frog  (Bheki),  and  disappeared  in  the  lake.  Neither 
nets  nor  anything  else  was  of  any  avail  for  bring- 
ing her  back,  the  king  had  lost  her  for  ever.  Thus 
true  knowledge  also  will  disappear  by  one  act  of 
negligence,  and  will  never  return. 

This  system  of  teaching  by  parables  was  very 
popular  with  the  Buddhists,  and  it  is  just  possible 
that  the  first  impulse  may  have  come  from  the  fol- 
lowers of  Kapila,  who  are  so  often  called  Krypto- 
buddhists  or  Pra&Manna-Bauddhas. 

I  have  called  attention  already  to  the  fact  that 
these  illustrative  parables,  though  they  do  not  occur 
in  the  Karikas  and  in  the  Tattva-samasa,  must  have 
existed  all  the  time  in  the  Parampara  of  the  Brah- 
mans,  because  they  appear  in  the  modern  Sutras, 
that  is  in  the  sixteenth  century.  Like  the  Sutras 
referring  to  these  stories,  other  Sutras  also  may 
occur  in  our  modern  collection  of  Samkhya-Siitras, 
which  existed  for  centuries,  as  handed  down  by 
tradition,  but  were  omitted  in  the  Karikas  and  even 
in  the  Tattva-samasa. 


DC! 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Yoga  and  Sawkhya. 

THE  relation  of  the  Yoga  to  theSam-khya-philosophy 
is  not  easy  to  determine,  but  the  Bhagavad-gita  V,  4, 
goes  so  far  as  to  say  that  children  only,  not  learned 
people,  distinguish  between  Samkhya  and  Yoga  at 
all,  as  it  were  between  faith  (knowledge)  and  works. 
We  find  the  S4mkhya  and  Yoga  represented,  each 
in  its  own  Sutras,  which  are  ascribed  to  different 
authors,  Kapila  and  Pataf^ali1,  and  they  are  spoken 
of  in  the  dual  as  the  two  old  systems  (Mahabh. 
XII.  104,  67)  ;  but  we  also  find  a  philosophy  called 
Sa?>?khya-yoga  (Svetasv.  Up.  II,  13),  and  this  not 
as  a  Dvandva,  as  it  were,  Sawkhya  and  Yoga,  but  as 
one  philosophy,  as  a  neuter  sing.,  representing  Yoga 
and  Samkhya  together  as  one,  or  possibly  as  Yoga 
belonging  to  the  Sa?nkhya.  Thus  we  read  again  in 
the  Bhagavad-gita  V,  5,  that  he  who  understands 
Sa//<khya  and  Yoga  to  be  one,  understands  aright. 
Yoga,  in  the  sense  of  ascetic  practices  and  medita- 
tions, may  no  doubt  have  existed  in  India  in  very 

'  The  identification  of  these  two  names  with  tho  n;ime  of 
one  person  Kapya  Fataf/A'ala,  who  is  mentioned  in  the  Siitn- 
patha-brahmawa,  once  proposed  by  Professor  Weber,  lias  prob- 
ably long  been  given  up  by  him.  See  also  Garbe,  Sawkhya- 
Philosophie,  p.  26. 


YOGA    AND    SAMKHYA.  403 

ancient  times.  It  is  called  Puratana  (old),  (B.  G. 
IV,  3),  and  this  is  probably  what  the  author  of 
the  Bhagavad-gita  (IV,  i)  meant,  when  he  made 
the  Bhagavat  say  to  Ar^una  : — 

'  I  declared  this  imperishable  Yoga  to  Vivasvat, 
Vivasvat  told  it  to  Manu,,  Manu  to  Ikshvaku.  Thus 
royal  sages  came  to  know  it,  having  received  it 
through  tradition  ;  but  this  Yoga  was  lost  here  by 
long  lapse  of  time.' 

A  similar  oral  tradition  descending  from  Pra^apati 
to  Manu,  and  from  Manu  to  the  people  (to  Ikshvaku, 
according  to  $awkara)  is  mentioned  already  in  the 
JjfMndogya  Upam'shad  (III,  n  ;  VIII,  15). 

It  is  much  the  same  with  the  other  philosophies, 
and  we  are  left  in  doubt  as  to  whether  the  three 
couples,  Samkhya  and  Yoga,  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika, 
nay  even  Purva-  and  Uttara-Mimamsa,  were  amal- 
gamations of  systems  which  had  originally  an  inde- 
pendent existence,  or  whether  they  were  differentia- 
tions of  former  systems.  Samkhya  and  Yoga  might 
easily  have  formed  one  comprehensive  system, 
because  their  divergence  with  regard  to  the  existence 
of  an  Isvara,  or  Lord,  was  not  so  essential  a  point  to 
them  as  it  seems  to  us.  Those  who  wanted  an  Isvara 
might  have  him  as  a  first  and  super-eminent 
Purusha  ;  while  those  who  had  gone  beyond  this 
want,  need  not  have  quarrelled  with  those  who  still 
felt  it.  The  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  show  clear  traces 
of  a  common  origin  ;  while  the  two  Mimamsas,  which 
in  character  are  more  remote  from  one  another  than 
the  other  systems,  seem  to  sanction,  by  their  names 
at  least,  the  suspicion  of  their  former  unity.  But  the 
deplorable  scarcity  of  any  historical  documents  does 
not  enable  us  to  go  beyond  mere  conjectures  ;  and 

D  d  2 


404  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

though  the  names  of  Kapila,  Vy.isa,  and  Gotama  may 
seem  to  have  an  older  air  than  those  of  Pataftr/ali, 
(raimini,  and  Kanada,  we  must  not  in  such  matters 
allow  ourselves  to  be  guided  by  mere  impressions. 
The  often-cited  passage  from  the  Vedanta-Sutras  II, 
i,  3,  Etena  YogaA  pratyuktaA,  'By  this  the  Yoga  is 
refuted/  proves  of  course  no  more  than  the  existence 
of  a  Yoga-philosophy  at  the  time  of  Badarayana  ;  it 
cannot  be  used  to  prove  the  existence  of  the  Yoga- 
Sutras,  such  as  we  possess  them,  as  previous  to  the 
composition  of  the  Vedanta-Sutras. 

Meanings  of  the  word  Yoga. 

In  the  Bhagavad-gitft  Yoga  is  defined  as  Samatva, 
equability  (II,  48).  It  has  been  repeated  again  and 
again  that  Yoga,  from  Yu</,  to  join,  meant  originally 
joining  the  deity,  or  union  with  it.  Even  native 
authors  occasionally  favour  that  view.  A  moment's 
consideration,  however,  would  have  shown  that  such 
an  idea  could  never  have  entered  the  mind  of 
a  Sawkhya,  for  the  simple  reason  that  there  was 
nothing  for  him  that  he  could  have  wished  to  join. 
Even  the  Vedantist  does  not  really  join  Brahman, 
though  this  is  a  very  common  misconception ;  nay,  a 
movement  of  the  soul  towards  Brahman  is  distinctly 
guarded  against  as  impossible.  The  soul  is  always 
Brahman,  even  though  it  does  not  know  it,  and  it 
only  requires  the  removal  of  ignorance  for  the  soul 
to  recover  its  Brahmahood,  or  to  become  what  it 
always  has  been.  Yu^/,  from  meaning  to  join,  came, 
by  means  of  a  very  old  metaphor,  to  mean  to  join 
oneself  to  something,  to  harness  oneself  for  some 
work.  Thus  Yu^/  assumed  the  sense  of  preparing 
for  hard  work,  whether  preparing  others  or  getting 


YOGA,    NOT    UNION,    BUT    DISUNION.  405 

ready  oneself.  And  as  people  with  us  use  the 
expression  to  go  into  harness,  i.  e.  to  prepare  for 
work,  or  to  buckle-to,  i.  e.  to  get  ready  for  hard  work, 
Yw/,  particularly  in  the  Atmanepada,  came  to  mean 
to  exert  oneself.  Possibly  the  German  Angespannt 
and  Anspannung  may  have  been  suggested  by  the 
same  metaphor,  though  the  usual  explanation  is 
that  it  was  so  by  a  metaphor  taken  from  the 
stretching  of  the  bow.  In  Sanskrit  this  Yu#  is 
often  used  with  such  words  as  Manas,  ./Tittam, 
Atman,  &c.,  in  the  sense  of  concentrating  or  exert- 
ing one's  mind  ;  and  it  is  in  this  sense  only  that  our 
word  Yoga  could  have  sprung  from  it,  meaning,  as 
the  Yoga-Sutras  tell  us  at  the  very  beginning,  I,  2, 
the  effort  of  restraining  the  activities  or  distractions 
of  our  thoughts  (TTitta-vHtti-nirodha),  or  the  effort 
of  concentrating  our  thoughts  on  a  definite  object. 

Yoga,  not  Union,  but  Disunion. 

A  false  interpretation  of  the  term  Yoga  as  union 
has  led  to  a  total  misrepresentation  of  Patark/ali's 
philosophy.  Rajendralal  Mitra,  p.  208,  was  therefore 
quite  right  when  he  wrote  :  '  Professor  Weber,  in  his 
History  of  Indian  Literature  (pp.  238-9),  has  entirely 
misrepresented  the  case.  He  says,  "  One  very  peculiar- 
side  of  the  Yoga  doctrine — and  one  which  was  more 
and  more  developed  as  time  went  on — is  the  Yoga 
practice,  that  is,  the  outward  means,  such  as  penances, 
mortifications,  and  the  like,  whereby  this  absorption 
into  the  supreme  Godhead  is  sought  to  be  attained." 
"  The  idea  of  absorption,"  he  continues  rightly,  "  into 
the  supreme  Godhead  forms  no  part  of  the  Yoga 
theory."  "  Pata%rali,  like  Kapila,"  he  adds,  "  rests 
satisfied  with  the  isolation  of  the  soul,  and  does  not 


406  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

pry  into  the  how  and  where  the  soul  abides  after 
separation."  '  But  when  he  charges  the  professor  with 
not  having  read  the  Yoga  he  goes  a  little  too  far, 
and  he  ought  to  have  known,  from  his  own  experi- 
ence, that  it  is  small  blame  to  a  man  who  writes 
a  complete  history  of  Indian  literature,  if  he  has  not 
read  every  book  on  which  he  has  to  pronounce  an 
opinion.  Even  the  best  historian  of  German  litera- 
ture can  hardly  have  read  every  German  author 
of  any  eminence,  much  less  can  the  first  historian  of 
Sanskrit  literature. 

Rajendralal  Mitra,  however,  is  quite  right  so  far 
that  Yoga,  in  the  philosophy  of  Pataf«/ali  and  Kapila, 
did  not  mean  union  with  God,  or  anything  but  effort 
(Udyoga,  not  Sa?nyoga),  pulling  oneself  together, 
exertion,  concentration.  Yoga  might  mean  union, 
but  the  proper  term  would  have  been  Sa?/iyoga. 
Thus  we  read  in  the  Bhagavad-gita  II,  50  :— 
Buddhiyukto  (/ahatiha  ubhe  sukn'tadushkrite, 
Tasmad  yogiya  yu(/yasva,  yogaA  karmasu  kausalam. 
'  He  who  is  devoted  to  knowledge  leaves  behind  both 
good  and  evil  deeds  ;  therefore  devote  yourself  to 
Yoga,  Yoga  is  success  in  (all)  actions.' 

That  native  scholars  were  well  aware  of  the  double 
meaning  of  Yoga,  we  may  see  from  a  verse  in  the 
beginning  of  Bho<yadeva's  commentary  on  the  Yoga- 
Sutras,  where  he  states  that,  with  a  true  Yogi n,  Yoga, 
joining,  means  really  Viyoga,  separation,  or  Viveka, 
discrimination  between  PurushaandPrakr/ti,  subject 
and  object,  self  and  nature,  such  as  it  is  taught  in  the 
Samkhya  :  Pumprakr/tyor  viyogo'pi  yoga  ityudito 
vaya, '  By  which  (teaching  of  Pata/i^ali)  Yoga  (union) 
is  said  to  be  Viyoga  (separation)  of  Purusha  and 
Prakn'ti.' 


YOGA    AS    VIVEKA.  407 

Yoga  as  Viveka. 

We  saw  that  this  Viyoga  or  Viveka  was  indeed 
the  highest  point  to  which  the  whole  of  the  Samkhya- 
philosophy  leads  up.  But  granted  that  this  dis- 
crimination, this  subduing  and  drawing  away  of  the 
Self  from  all  that  is  not  Self,  is  the  highest  object  of 
philosophy,  how  is  it  to  be  reached,  and  even  when 
reached,  how  is  it  to  be  maintained  ?  By  know- 
ledge chiefly,  would  be  the  answer  of  Kapila  (by 
(rfianayoga)  ;  by  ascetic  exercises  delivering  the  Self 
from  the  fetters  of  the  body  and  the  bodily  senses, 
(by  Karmayoga)  adds  Patawr/ali.  Patan^ali  by  no 
means  ignores  the  (rftanayoga  of  Kapila.  On  the 
contrary,  he  presupposes  it  ;  he  only  adds,  as  a 
useful  support,  a  number  of  exercises,  bodily  as  well 
as  mental,  by  which  the  senses  should  be  kept  in 
subjection  so  as  not  to  interfere  again  with  the 
concentration  of  all  thoughts  on  the  Self  or  the 
Purusha  l.  In  that  sense  he  tells  us  in  the  second 
Sutra  that  Yoga  is  the  effort  of  restraining  the 
activity  or  distractions  of  our  thoughts.  Before  we 
begin  to  scoff  at  the  Yoga  and  its  minute  treatment 
of  postures,  breathings,  and  other  means  of  mental 
concentration,  we  ought  first  of  all  to  try  to  under- 
stand their  original  intention.  Everything  can 
become  absurd  by  exaggeration,  and  this  has  been, 
no  doubt,  the  case  with  the  self-imposed  discipline 
and  tortures  of  the  Yogins.  But  originally  their 

1  I  prefer,  even  in  the  Sawkhya-philosophy,  to  render 
Purusha  by  Self  rather  than  by  man,  because  in  English  man 
cannot  be  used  in  the  sense  of  simply  subject  or  soul.  Besides, 
Atman,  Self,  is  often  used  by  Pata%ali  himself  for  Purusha, 
cf.  Yoga-Sutras  III,  21  ;  II,  41. 


408  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

object  seems  to  have  been  no  other  than  to  counteract 
the  distractions  of  the  senses.  We  all  consider  the 
closing  of  the  eyelids  and  the  stopping  of  the  ears 
against  disturbing  noises  useful  for  serious  medita- 
tion. This  was  the  simple  beginning  of  Yoga,  and 
in  that  sense  it  was  meant  to  be  a  useful  addition  to 
the  Sa??ikhya,  because  even  a  convinced  Samkhya 
philosopher  who  had  obtained  6rfianayoga  or  know- 
ledge-yoga would  inevitably  suffer  from  the  disturb- 
ances caused  by  external  circumstances  and  the 
continual  inroads  of  the  outer  world  upon  him, 
i.  e.  upon  his  Manas,  unless  strengthened  to  resist 
by  Karmayoga  or  work-yoga  the  ever  present  enemy 
of  his  peace  of  mind.  More  minute  directions  as  to 
how  this  desired  concentration  and  abstraction  could 
be  achieved  and  maintained,  might  at  first  have  been 
quite  harmless,  but  if  carried  too  far  they  would 
inevitably  produce  those  torturing  exercises  which 
seemed  to  Buddha,  as  they  do  to  most  people,  so 
utterly  foolish  and  useless.  But  if  we  ourselves  must 
admit  that  our  senses  and  all  that  they  imply  are 
real  obstacles  to  quiet  meditation,  the  attempts  to 
reduce  these  sensuous  affections  to  some  kind  of 
quietude  or  equability  (Samatva)  need  not  surprise 
us,  nor  need  we  be  altogether  incredulous  as  to 
the  marvellous  results  obtained  by  means  of  ascetic 
exercises  by  Yogins  in  India,  as  little  as  we  should 
treat  the  visions  of  St.  Francis  or  St.  Teresa  as 
downright  impositions.  The  real  relation  of  the 
soul  to  the  body  and  of  the  senses  to  the  soul  is  still 
as  great  a  mystery  to  us  as  it  was  to  the  ancient 
Yogins  of  India,  and  their  experiences,  if  only  honestly 
related,  deserve  certainly  the  same  careful  attention 
as  the  stigmata  of  lloman  Catholic  saints.  They 


YOGA    AS    VIVEKA.  409 

may  be  or  they  may  not  be  true,  but  there  is  no 
reason  why  they  should  be  treated  as  a  priori  untrue. 
From  this  point  of  view  it  seems  to  me  that  the 
Yoga-philosophy  deserves  some  attention  on  the  part 
of  philosophers,  more  particularly  of  the  physical 
school  of  psychologists,  and  I  did  not  feel  justified 
therefore  in  passing  over  this  system  altogether, 
though  it  may  be  quite  true  that,  after  we  have  once 
understood  the  position  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy 
towards  the  great  problem  of  the  world,  we  shall 
not  glean  many  new  metaphysical  or  psychological 
ideas  from  a  study  of  the  Yoga.  We  must  never 
forget  that,  although  our  Samkhya-Sutras  are  very 
modern,  the  Samkhya  as  such,  is  not,  and  is  always 
presupposed  by  the  Yoga.  It  has  its  roots  in  a  soil 
carefully  prepared  by  centuries  of  philosophical 
cultivation,  and  has  but  little  in  common  with  the 
orgiastic  ecstasies  which  we  see  among  savage  tribes 
of  the  present  day.  The  Hindus  also,  before  they 
became  civilised  and  philosophers,  may  or  may  not 
have  passed  through  such  a  phase.  But  how  little 
of  true  similarity  there  really  exists  between  the 
Yoga  and  Tapas  of  the  Hindus,  and  the  sweating 
processes  of  the  American  Indians  in  their  steam- 
booths,  may  easily  be  seen  from  the  excellent 
Reports  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology,  by  J.  W. 
Powell,  1892-3,  p.  117  seq.  ;  p.  823  seq.,  to  mention 
no  other  and  more  painful  reports. 

Before  we  enter  upon  an  examination  of  the 
peculiar  teaching  of  the  Yoga-philosophy,  a  few 
words  with  reference  to  the  sources  on  which  we 
have  to  depend  for  our  information  may  be 
useful. 


410  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Pata?I#ali,  Vyasa. 

The  Sutras  of  the  Yoga-philosophy  are  ascribed 
to  Patari^ali,  who  is  also  called  Phamn  or  $esha,  the 
divine  serpent.  He  may  have  been  the  author  or  the 
representative  of  the  Yoga-philosophy  without  being 
necessarily  the  author  of  the  Sutras.  His  date  is  of 
course  uncertain,  though  some  scholars  have,  with 
great  assurance,  assigned  him  to  the  second  cen- 
tury B.C.  It  may  be  so,  but  we  should  say  no  more. 
Even  the  commonly  received  identification  of  the 
philosopher  Patan^ali  with  Pata/1(/ali,  the  gram- 
marian and  author  of  the  Mahabhashya,  should  be 
treated  as  yet  as  a  hypothesis  only.  We  know  too 
little  about  the  history  of  Sanskrit  proper  names  to 
be  able  to  say  whether  the  same  name  implies  the 
same  person.  That  is  not  the  case  in  any  other 
country,  and  can  hardly  be  true  in  India  considering 
how  freely  the  names  of  the  gods  or  of  great  Rishis 
were  taken,  and  are  still  taken,  as  proper  names. 
It  has  actually  been  asserted  that  Vyasa,  the  author 
of  a  late  commentary  on  Pata/l^ali's  Yoga-Sutras,  is 
the  same  person  as  Vyasa,  the  collector  of  the  Vedas, 
the  reputed  author  of  the  Mahabharata  and  of  the 
Vedanta-Sutras.  But  there  are  ever  so  many  Vyasas 
living  even  now,  and  no  solid  argument  could  pos- 
sibly be  derived  from  the  mere  recurrence  of  such 
a  name.  There  are  works  ascribed  to  Hira/jya- 
garbha,  Ilarihara,  Vislmu,  &c. ;  then  why  not  to 
Pata/Vyali  ?  It  is  of  course  as  impossible  to  prove 
that  Pata/V/ali  the  philosopher  and  Pata?Vyali  the 
grammarian  were  not  the  same  person,  as  to  prove 
that  they  were ;  but  if  style  of  language  and  style 
of  thought  are  any  safe  guides  in  such  matters,  we 


SECOND    CENTURY    B.C.  411 

ought  certainly  to  hesitate,  and  should  do  so  in  any 
other  literature,  before  taking  the  grammarian  and 
the  philosopher  Patafk/ali  as  one  and  the  same  per- 
son. It  would  no  doubt  be  a  great  help  if  we 
could  transfer  the  date  of  the  grammarian,  the 
second  century  B.C.,  to  the  author  of  our  Yoga- 
Sutras,  but  on  that  point  also  it  seems  to  me  better 
to  wait  till  we  get  some  more  tangible  proof.  In 
the  present  state  of  knowledge,  or  rather  ignorance, 
of  all  dates  to  be  assigned  to  the  philosophical 
Sutras,  it  is  the  duty  of  every  scholar  to  abstain 
from  premature  assertions  which  only  encumber  and 
obstruct  the  way  to  further  discoveries. 

Second  Century  B.C. 

The  second  century  would  certainly  be  most 
welcome  as  a  date  for  any  of  our  extant  philoso- 
phical Sutras,  but  that  is  no  excuse  for  saying  that 
the  Yoga-philosophy  was  reduced  to  the  form  of 
Sutras  in  that  century,  because  the  grammarian 
Patan^ali  has  been  referred  to  it.  Besides,  even  the 
date  assigned  to  the  grammarian  Patafk/ali  is  a  con- 
structive date  only,  and  should  not  for  the  present 
be  considered  as  more  than  a  working  hypothesis. 
The  fact  that  these  Yoga-Sutras  do  not  enter  on 
any  controversy  might  certainly  seem  to  speak  in 
favour  of  their  being  anterior  to  the  other  Sutras  ; 
but  we  saw  already  why  we  could  no  more  build 
any  chronological  conclusions  on  this  than  we 
should  think  of  proving  the  anteriority  of  our 
Sa?nkbya-Sutras  by  the  attacks  on  its  atheistical 
doctrines  which  occur  in  the  Sutras  of  the  other 
philosophical  systems.  I  think  we  must  be  satis- 
fied with  the  broad  fact  that  Buddha  was  later 


412  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

than  the  classical  Upanishads,  and  that  our  philo- 
sophical Sutras  are  later  than  Buddha,  because  they 
evidently  refer  to  his  doctrines,- though  not  to  his 
name.  As  to  popular  tradition,  it  is  no  doubt  of  little 
value,  particularly  in  India ;  still  I  doubt  whether 
tradition  could  have  gone  so  completely  wrong  as 
to  prophesy  in  the  Saiikshepa-^amkara-Vir/aya  *  and 
elsewhere  that  (raimini,  Vyasa,  Patan^ali,  and  S&m- 
kara  would  appear  on  earth  to  uproot  all  heresies, 
if  they  had  lived  before  the  great  heresy  of  Buddha. 
Pata7l(/ali  is  said  to  have  been  a  portion  of  Sarikar- 
sha?ia  or  Anarita,  the  hooded  serpent  /Sesha,  encircling 
the  world,  and  it  may  be  for  the  same  reason  that  he 
is  sometimes  called  Pha?iin  (Phambhartn).  This 
is  the  kind  of  useless  information  which  tradition 
gives  us. 

Chronology  of  Thought. 

Iii  India  we  must  learn  to  be  satisfied  with  the 
little  we  know,  not  of  the  chronology  of  years,  but  of 
the  chronology  of  thought  ;  and  taking  the  Yoga, 
in  its  systematic  form,  i.  e.  in  the  Pataf^ali-Siitras, 
as  post-Buddhistic,  we  can  best  understand  the 
prominence  which  it  gives  both  to  the  exercises 
which  are  to  help  toward  overcoming  the  distracting 
influences  of  the  outer  world,  and  to  the  arguments 
in  support  of  the  existence  of  an  Ixvara  or  Divine 
Lord.  This  marked  opposition  became  intelligible 
and  necessary  as  directed  against  Kapila  as  well  as 
against  Buddha  ;  and  in  reading  the  Yoga-Sutras  it 
is  often  difficult  to  say  whether  the  author  had  his 
eye  on  the  one  or  the  other.  Jf  we  took  away  these 

1  Yoga  Aphorisms,  p.  Ixvi. 


CHRONOLOGY  OF  THOUGHT.  413 

two  characteristic  features  of  the  Yoga,  the  wish  to 
establish  the  existence  of  an  Isvara  against  all 
comers,  and  to  teach  the  means  of  restraining  the 
affections  and  passions  of  the  soul,  as  a  preparation 
for  true  knowledge,  such  as  taught  by  the  Sawikhya- 
philosophy,  little  would  seem  to  remain  that  is 
peculiar  to  Patafw/ali. 

But  though  the  Sutras  are  post-Buddhistic,  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  not  only  the  general  outlines 
of  the  Samkhya,  but  likewise  all  that  belongs  to 
the  Karmayoga  or  work-yoga  was  known  before 
the  rise  of  Buddhism.  Thus,  if  we  turn  to  the 
Mahabharata,  we  find  that  the  twenty-four  principia, 
with  Purusha  as  the  twenty-fifth,  are  often  men- 
tioned, though  arranged  and  described  in  different 
ways.  Then  we  read  again  (Anugita  XXV) :  '  That 
which  sages  by  their  understanding  meditate  upon, 
which  is  void  of  smell,  of  taste,  of  colour,  touch  or 
sound,  that  is  called  Pradhana  (Prak?Tti).  That 
Pradhana  is  unperceived  ;  a  development  of  this  un- 
perceived  power  is  the  Mahat ;  and  a  development  of 
the  Pradhana  (when  it  has)  become  Mahat,  is  Aham- 
kara  (egoism).  From  Ahamkara  is  produced  the 
development,  namely,  the  great  elements,  and  from 
the  elements  respectively,  the  objects  of  sense  are 
stated  to  be  a  development.' 

As  to  the  Yoga-practices  or  tortures  we  know 
that,  after  practising  the  most  severe  Tapas  for  a 
time,  Buddha  himself  declared  against  it,  and  rather 
moderated  than  encouraged  the  extravagant  exercises 
of  Brahmanic  ascetics.  His  own  experience  at  the 
beginning  of  his  career  had  convinced  him  of  their 
uselessness,  nay,  of  their  danger.  But  a  moderately 
ascetic  life,  a  kind  of  via  media,  remained  throughout 


414  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  ideal  of  Buddhism,  and  we  can  well  understand 
that  the  Brahmans,  in  trying  to  hold  their  own 
against  the  Buddhists,  should  have  tried  to  place 
before  the  people  an  even  more  perfect  system  of 
asceticism.  And,  lest  it  should  be  supposed  that 
the  Sa??ikhya-philosophy,  which  was  considered  as 
orthodox  or  Vedic,  had  given  its  sanction  to  Buddha's 
denial  of  an  Atman  and  Brahman,  which  was  far  more 
serious  than  the  denial  of  an  Isvara,  Lord,  it  would 
have  seemed  all  the  more  necessary  to  protest  de- 
cidedly against  such  denial,  and  thus  to  satisfy  the 
ingrained  theistlc  tendencies  of  the  people  at  large, 
by  showing  that  the  Samkhya,by  admitting  Purusha, 
admitted  a  belief  in  something  transcendent,  and 
did  by  no  means,  according  to  Patan^ali  at  least, 
condemn  a  belief  even  in  an  Isvara,  or  Lord.  In  that 
sense  it  might  truly  be  said  that  the  Yoga-philosophy 
would  have  been  timely  and  opportune,  if  it  came 
more  boldly  forward,  after  the  rise  of  Buddhism, 
not  so  much  as  a  new  system  of  thought,  but  as 
a  re-invigorated  and  determined  assertion  of  ancient 
Samkhya  doctrines,  which  for  a  time  had  been 
thrown  into  the  shade  by  the  Buddhist  apostasy. 
In  this  way  it  would  become  intelligible  that 
Buddhism,  though  sprung  from  a  soil  saturated 
with  Sfiwkhya  ideas,  should  have  been  anterior  to 
that  new  and  systematic  development  of  Samkhya- 
philosophy,  which  we  know  in  the  Sutras  of  Kapila 
or  in  the  Karikas  or  even  in  the  Tattva-samasa ; 
that  in  fact,  in  its  elements,  the  Sa/mkhya  should 
be  as  decidedly  pre- Buddhistic  as  in  its  final 
systematic  form  it  was  post -Buddhistic.  That 
the  existence  side  by  side  of  two  such  systems 
as  those  of  Kapila  and  Buddha,  the  one  deemed 


THE    YOGA-PHILOSOPHY.  415 

orthodox,  the  other  unorthodox,  gave  matter  for 
reflection  to  the  people  in  India  we  see  best  by 
a  well-known  verse  which  I  quoted  many  years 
ago  in  my  History  of  Ancient  Sanskrit  Literature 
(p.  102)  :  '  If  Buddha  knew  the  law  and  Kapila  not, 
what  is  truth  ?  If  both  were  omniscient,  how  could 
there  be  difference  of  opinion  between  the  two  ? ' 

The  Yoga-Philosophy. 

The  Yoga-Sutras,  or  the  Yoganusasana1,  called  also 
by  the  same  name  which  was  given  to  the  Samkhya- 
Sutras,  viz.  Samkhya-prava&ana,  both  being  consi- 
dered as  expositions  of  the  old  Samkhya,  may  have 
been  contained  originally  in  some  such  text-book 
as  the  Tattva-samasa.  The  Sutras  were  published 
and  translated  by  Ballantyne,  1852,  a  translation 


1  It  is  not  much  of  an  argument,  but  it  may  deserve  to  be 
mentioned,  that  the  title  given  by  Pata%ali  to  the  Yoga-Sutras. 
Atha  Yoganusasanam,  'Now  begins  the  teaching  of  the  Yoga.' 
and  not  Atha  Yogar/i<7«asa,  reminds  us  of  the  title  which 
the  grammarian  Pataf^ali  gives  to  his  Mahabhashya,  Atha 
$abdanusasanam,  'Now  begins  the  teaching  of  Words  or  of 
the  Word.'  This  title  does  not  belong  to  Pamni's  Sutras,  but 
to  the  Mahabhashya ;  and  it  is  curious  that  such  a  compound 
as  /Sabdanusasanam  would  really  offend  against  one  of  Panini's 
rules  (II,  2,  14).  According  to  Pamni  there  ought  to  be  no 
such  compound,  and  though  he  does  not  give  us  the  reason 
why  he  objects  to  this  and  other  such-like  compounds,  we  can 
easily  see  that  Sanskrit  did  not  sanction  compounds  which 
might  be  ambiguous,  considering  that  Word-teaching  might  be 
taken  in  the  sense  of  teaching  coming  from  words  as  well  as 
teaching  having  words  for  its  object.  It  is  true  that  this 
apparent  irregularity  might  be  removed  by  a  reference  to 
another  rule  of  Pawini  (II,  3,  66),  yet  it  is  curious  that  the 
same,  if  only  apparent,  irregularity  should  occur  both  in  the 
Mahabhashya  and  in  the  Yoga-Sutras,  both  being  ascribed  to 


416  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

continued  by  Govindadeva-sastrin  in  the  Pandit, 
vol.  Ill,  Nos.  28-68.  A  more  useful  edition,  but 
not  always  quite  correct  translation,  was  given  by 
Rajendralal  Mitra  in  the  Bibliotheca  Indica,  1883, 
'Yoga  Aphorisms  of  Patafk/ali,  with  the  commen- 
tary of  Bho^a  Ra(/a.'  Vi^lana-Bhikshu,  whose  com- 
mentary on  Kapila's  Sawkhya-Sutras  was  mentioned 
before  \  and  who  is  chiefly  known  by  his  Yoga- 
varttika,  is  the  author  also  of  the  Yoga-sara-sam- 
graha,  an  abstract  of  the  Yoga,  which  has  been 
edited  and  translated  by  Ganganatha  Jha,  Bombay, 
1894,  and  may  be  consulted  with  advantage  by 
students  of  philosophy.  Colebrooke's  essay  on  the 
Yoga,  like  all  his  essays,  is  still  most  useful  and 
trustworthy  ;  and  there  are  in  German  the  excellent 
papers  on  the  Samkhya  and  Yoga  by  Professor 
Garbe  in  Biihler's  Grundriss.  Garbe  speaks  well  of 
a  dissertation  by  P.  Markus,  Die  Yoga-philosophie 
nacli  clem  Itdjamdrtanda  daryestellt,  which,  how- 
ever, I  have  not  been  able  to  obtain. 

Misconception  of  the  Objects  of  Yoga. 

It  was  almost  impossible  that  the  Yoga-philosophy, 
as   represented  by  European  scholars,   should   not 

1   Other  works  ascribed  to  the  same  author  are : — 

The  Brahma-mimawsa-bhashya,  called  Vi</nananmta. 
The  Sawkhya-karika-bhashya,  ascribed  to  him,  but  really 

composed  by  GaueZapada  (see  Ganganatha,  p.  2). 
The  Yoga-vfirttika. 

The  Isvara-gita-bhashya,  from  the  Kurma-purawa. 
The  Prasnopanishad-aloka. 
An  explanation   of  Prasastapada's  commentary   on  the 

Vaiseshika-Sutras,  called  Vaiseshika-varttika. 
There  are  printed  editions   of  the   Samkhya-prava&ana- 

bhashya,  the  Yoga-varttika,  and  the  Samkhya-sara. 


MISCONCEPTION    OF    THE    OBJECTS    OF    YOGA.       417 

have  suffered  from  its  close  association  with  the 
Samkhya,  properly  so  called.  All  its  metaphysical 
antecedents  were  there.  Yoga  is  indeed,  as  the 
Brahmans  say,  Samkhya,  only  modified,  particularly 
in  one  point,  namely,  in  its  attempt  to  develop  and 
systematise  an  ascetic  discipline  by  which  con- 
centration of  thought  could  be  attained,  and  by 
admitting  devotion  to  the  Lord  God  as  part  of  that 
discipline.  Whether  this  was  done,  as  is  generally 
supposed,  from  mere  theological  diplomacy  is  a 
question  we  should  find  difficult  to  answer,  con- 
sidering how  little  we  know  of  the  personal  character 
of  Pata?k/ali  or  of  the  circumstances  under  which 
he  elaborated  his  theistic  Samkbya-philosophy. 
There  is  an  entire  absence  of  animosity  on  his  part, 
such  as  our  own  philosophers  would  certainly  have 
displayed  in  accusing  another  philosopher  of  atheism 
and  in  trying  to  amend  his  system  in  a  theistic 
direction.  No  doubt  there  must  always  have  been 
a  majority  in  favour  of  a  theistic  philosophy  of 
the  universe  as  against  an  atheistic,  but  whether 
Pata/l^ali  may  be  fairly  accused  of  having  yielded 
to  the  brutal  force  of  numbers,  and  curried  favour 
with  the  many  against  the  few  is  quite  another 
question.  It  is  certainly  extraordinary  to  see  the 
perfect  calmness  with  which,  with  very  few  ex- 
ceptions, Kapila's  atheism  is  discussed,  and  how 
little  there  is  of  the  adpopulum  advocacy  in  support 
of  a  belief  in  God  and  a  personal  God.  Nor  does 
Kapila,  like  other  atheistic  philosophers,  display  any 
animosity  against  the  Divine  idea  and  its  defenders. 
He  criticises  indeed  the  usual  arguments  by  which 
theists  make  and  unmake  their  God,  if  they  represent 
Him  as  the  creator  and  ruler  of  the  world,  and 

E  e 


418  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

charge  him  at  the  same  time  with  cruelty,  by 
making  him  responsible  for  the  origin  of  evil  also. 
But  all  this  is  done  by  Kapila  in  a  calm  and  what 
one  might  almost  call  a  businesslike  manner ;  and 
in  answering  Kapila's  arguments,  Pata?l^ali  also 
preserves  the  same  Samatva  or  even  temper.  He 
imputes  no  motives  to  his  antagonist,  nor  does 
he  anywhere  defend  himself  against  any  possible 
suspicion  that  in  showing  the  necessity  of  a  personal 
God,  an  Isvara,  he  was  defending  the  interests  of 
the  Brahman  priesthood.  After  all,  Isvara  was  not 
even  a  popular  name  for  God,  or  the  name  of  any 
special  god,  though  it  occurs  as  a  name  of  Rudra, 
and  in  later  times  was  applied  even  to  such  gods  as 
Vistmu  and  /Siva,  after  they  had  been  divested  of 
much  of  their  old  mythological  trappings. 

Devotion  to  isvara,  Misconceptions. 

In  this  respect  also  we  have  something  to  learn 
from  Hindu  philosophers.  Considering  the  impor- 
tance of  the  subject,  it  is  useful  to  see  how  little 
heat  was  expended  on  it  either  by  Kapila  or  by 
Pataw/ali.  If  we  remember  how  the  two  philo- 
sophies were  in  popular  parlance  distinguished  from 
each  other  as  Sawikhya  with  and  Sa?»khya  without 
a  Lord,  we  should  have  expected  to  see  this  ques- 
tion treated  in  the  most  prominent  place.  Instead 
of  which  we  find  Pataw/ali,  at  the  end  of  the  first 
chapter,  after  having  described  the  different  prac- 
tices by  which  a  man  may  hope  to  become  free  from 
all  worldly  fetters,  mentioning  simply  as  one  of  many 
expedients,  I,  23,  'Devotion  to  the  Lord,'  or,  as  it 
is  generally  translated  'devotion  to  God.'  Devotion 
or  Pranidhdna  (lit.  placing  oneself  forward  and  into) 


DEVOTION    TO    ISVARA,    MISCONCEPTIONS.  419 

is  explained  by  Bho^a  as  one  of  the  forms  of 
resignation,  as  worship  of  Him,  and  as  the  sur- 
render of  all  one's  actions  to  Him.  If  a  man,  without 
wishing  for  any  rewards  consisting  in  worldly  enjoy- 
ments, makes  over  all  his  cares  to  Isvara  as  the 
highest  guide,  that,  we  are  told,  is  Pramdhana. 
Pata>1<7ali  then  goes  on,  '  As  it  has  been  said  that 
Samadhi  or  complete  absorption  can  be  obtained 
through  devotion  to  the  Lord,  the  next  that  has  to 
be  explained  in  order,  is  the  nature  of  that  Lord, 
the  proof,  the  majesty,  the  name  of  Him,  the  order 
of  His  worship,  and  the  fruit  thereof.'  In  I,  24 
Patark/ali  goes  on  to  say  :  '  I-svara,  the  Lord,  is  a 
Purusha  (Self)  that  has  never  been  touched  by 
sufferings,  actions,  rewards,  or  consequent  disposi- 
tions.' The  commentary  adds  :  '  Sufferings  are  such 
as  Nescience,  Avidya,  &c. ;  actions  are  either  enjoined, 
forbidden,  or  mixed  ;  rewards  are  the  ripened  fruits 
of  actions  manifested  in  birth  (genus,  caste)  and 
life,  while  dispositions  (Asaya,  Anlage)  are  so-called 
because  they  lie  in  the  soil  of  the  mind  till  the  fruit 
has  ripened,  they  are  instincts  (Samskara)  or  impres- 
sions (Vasana).  If  the  Lord  is  called  a  Purusha, 
that  means  that  He  is  different  from  all  other 
Purushas  (Selves),  and  if  He  is  called  Lord,  that 
means  that  He  is  able  by  His  work  alone  to  liberate 
the  whole  world.  Such  power  is  due  to  the  con- 
stant prevalence  of  goodness  (a  Guna)  in  Him,  who 
has  no  beginning,  and  this  prevalence  of  goodness 
arises  from  His  eminent  knowledge.  But  the  two, 
knowledge  and  power,  are  not  dependent  on  each 
other,  for  they  are  eternally  abiding  in  the  very 
substance  of  Isvara.  His  very  relation  to  that 
goodness  is  without  beginning,  because  the  union 

E  e  2 


420  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  Prakrit!  and  Purusha,  that  is,  the  creation  would, 
from  a  Yoga  point  of  view,  have  been  impossible 
without  the  will  of  such  an  Lsvara.  While  the 
Altta  or  mind  in  ordinary  Purushas  or  Selves 
undergoes,  while  in  the  body,  modifications  tending 
towards  happiness,  unhappiness,  and  delusion,  and, 
if  remaining  without  blemish,  good,  and  full  of 
virtue,  becomes  conscious  of  the  incidence  of  the 
pictures  mirrored  on  the  mind,  it  is  not  so  with 
Isvara.  His  highest  modification  is  of  goodness 
alone,  and  he  remains  steadfast  in  enjoyment  through 
eternal  union  with  it.  Therefore  he  alone  is  Isvara, 
eminent  above  all  other  Purushas.  Again,  even  for 
one  who  has  gained  freedom,  a  return  of  suffer- 
ings, &c.,  is  possible,  and  has  to  be  guarded  against 
by  such  means  as  are  inculcated  in  the  Yoga  ;  but 
he,  the  Isvara,  as  he  is  always  such  as  he  is,  is  not 
like  a  man  who  has  gained  freedom,  but  he  is  by 
nature  free.  Nor  should  one  say  that  there  may 
be  many  such  Isvaras.  Though  there  be  equality 
of  Purushas,  qud  Purushas,  yet  as  their  aims 
are  different,  such  a  view  would  be  impossible. 
And  though  there  be  a  possibility  of  more  or  less, 
yet  the  most  eminent  would  always  be  the  Isvara 
or  the  Lord,  he  alone  having  reached  the  final  goal 
of  lordship.' 

The  Patafyyala-bhashya  dwells  very  strongly  on 
this  difference  between  the  liberated  soul  and  the 
Lord  ;  for  'the  liberated  or  isolated  souls,'  it  says, 
'attain  their  isolation  by  rending  asunder  the  three 
bonds,  whereas  in  regard  to  Isvara  there  never  was 
and  never  can  be  such  bondage.  The  emancipated 
implies  bondage,  but  this  can  never  be  predicated  of 
the  Lord.' 


WHAT    IS    ISVARA?  42! 

We  need  not  point  out  here  the  weak  points  of 
this  argument,  and  the  purely  relative  character 
of  the  greatness  and  separateness  claimed  for  the 
Isvara,  as  compared  with  other  Purushas,  but  it 
may  be  well  to  try  to  compare  our  own  ideas  of 
God,  when  put  into  clear  and  simple  language,  with 
the  ideas  here  propounded.  Pataf^ali  seems  to  me 
to  come  very  near  to  the  Homoiousia  of  man  with 
God,  though  he  does  not  go  quite  as  far  as  the  Ve- 
dantin  who  claims  for  the  Atman  perfect  Homoousia 
with  Brahman.  His  Isvara  may  be  primus  inter 
pares,  but  as  one  of  the  Purushas,  he  is  but  one 
among  his  peers.  He  is  a  little  more  than  a  god, 
but  he  is  certainly  not  what  we  mean  by  God. 

What  is  Isvara? 

As  Kapila  had  declared  that  the  existence  of 
such  a  being  as  Isvara  did  not  admit  of  proof, 
Pata?l^ali  proceeds  in  the  next  SCitra  to  offer  what 
he  calls  his  proofs,  by  saying :  '  In  Him  the  seed  of 
the  omniscient  (or  omniscience)  attains  infinity.' 
It  would  be  difficult  to  discover  in  this  anything 
like  a  proof  or  a  tenable  appeal  to  any  Prama/ia, 
without  the  help  of  the  commentary.  But  Bho^/a 
explains  that  what  is  meant  here  is  that  there  are 
different  degrees  of  all  excellences,  such  as  omnisci- 
ence, greatness,  smallness,  and  other  Aisvaryas,  and 
that  therefore  there  must  be  for  all  of  them  a  point 
beyond  which  it  is  impossible  to  go.  This  Niratisaya 
point,  this  non  plus  ultra  of  excellence,  is  what  is 
claimed  for  Isvara  or  the  Lord. 

Though  this  could  hardly  be  considered  as  a 
convincing  argument  of  the  existence  of  a  Being 
endowed  with  all  such  transcendent  excellences  as 


422  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

are  here  postulated,  it  shows  at  all  events  an  honest 
intention  on  the  part  of  Patafi^ali.  Patafw/ali's  argu- 
ment reminds  us  to  a  certain  extent  of  the  theistic 
argument  of  Cleanthes  and  Boethius.  What  he  means 
is  that  where  there  is  a  great  and  greater,  there 
must  also  be  a  greatest,  and  this  is  Isvara,  and  that 
where  there  is  good  and  better,  there  must  be  best. 

Nor  does  he  flinch  in  trying  to  answer  the 
questions  which  follow.  The  question  is  supposed 
to  have  been  asked,  how  this  Isvara,  without  any 
inducement,  could  have  caused  that  union  and 
separation  of  himself  and  Prakn'ti  which,  as  we 
saw,  is  only  another  name  for  creation.  The  answer 
is  that  the  inducement  was  his  love  of  beings, 
arising  from  his  mercifulness,  his  determination 
being  to  save  all  living  beings  at  the  time  of  the 
Kalpapralayas  and  Mahapralayas,  the  great  destruc- 
tions and  reconstructions  of  the  world.  This,  of 
course,  would  not  have  been  admitted  by  Kapila. 

Next  Pata/lgrali  proceeds  to  explain  the  majesty 
of  Isvara  by  saying,  in  I,  26, — 

'  He  is  the  superior  (Guru)  even  of  the  former 
ones,  being  himself  not  limited  by  time.' 

By  the  former  ones  are  meant,  as  we  are  told, 
the  ancients,  the  first  creators,  such  as  Brahma 
and  others,  and  by  superior  is  meant  instructor  and 
guide,  so  that  it  would  seem  difficult  to  assign  a 
higher  position  to  any  divine  being  than  by  placing 
him  thus  above  Brahma  and  other  accepted  builders 
of  the  world.  Next  follows  his  name,  I,  27  : — 

'  His  name  is  Pra?^ava.' 

Pranava  might  etymologically  mean  breathing 
forth  or  glory.  It  is  assigned  as  a  name  to  the 
sacred  syllable  Cm,  possibly  a  relic  of  a  time  beyond 


WHAT    IS    LS'VARA?  423 

our  reach.  It  is  said  to  have  been  the  name  of 
I«9vara  from  all  eternity,  just  as  the  name  of  father 
or  son.  This  may  be  true,  but  it  does  not  satisfy 
us.  However  old  the  name  Pranava  and  the 
syllable  Om  may  have  been,  they  must  have  had 
a  beginning,  but  in  spite  of  all  the  theories  of  the 
Brahmans,  there  is  not  one  in  the  least  satisfactory 
to  the  scholar.  Om  is  their  sacred  syllable,  which 
has  to  be  repeated  a  hundred  or  a  thousand  times 
in  order  to  draw  the  mind  away  from  all  disturbing 
impressions  and  to  concentrate  it  on  the  Supreme 
Being.  But  why  it  is  so  we  cannot  tell.  It  may  be 
a  mere  imitation  of  the  involuntary  outbreathing  of 
the  deep  vowel  o,  stopped  by  the  labial  nasal,  and 
then  drawn  in  ;  or  it  may  be  the  contraction  of  a  pro- 
nominal stem  Avam,  '  that,'  corresponding  to  Ayam, 
'  this,'  and  it  is  certainly  used  in  the  sense  of  Yes, 
much  as  hoc  illud  was  used  in  French  when  con- 
tracted to  oui.  But  however  that  may  be,  it  is 
called  PraTiava,  praise  or  breathing  forth,  and  cannot 
be  explained  any  further  etymologically.  It  is  a 
name,  as  Bho^a  says,  riot  made  by  anybody,  and 
if  it  has  any  historical  or  etymological  justification, 
this  is  at  all  events  not  known  to  us.  Still  we 
cannot  go  quite  so  far  as  Rajendralal  Mitra,  who 
sees  in  it  an  Indianised  form  of  the  Hebrew  Amen  ! 
First  of  all,  Amen  does  not  mean  God,  and  how 
should  such  a  word  have  reached  India  during  the 
Brahmana  period  ? 

Pataw/ali  continues  by  telling  us  in  Sutra  I,  38, 
that  repetition  of  the  syllable  Om  and  reflection 
on  its  meaning  are  incumbent  on  the  student  of 
Yoga.  And  this,  as  Bho^a  adds,  as  a  means  to 
concentrate  our  thoughts,  and  to  attain  to  Samadhi, 


424  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  chief  end  of  the  whole  Yoga-philosophy.  In 
that  sense  he  adds,  I,  29  : — 

'Thence  also  obtainment  of  inward-turned  thought, 
and  absence  of  obstacles.' 

Inward-turned  thought  (Pratyak£etana)  is  ex- 
plained as  a  turning  away  of  our  senses  from  all 
outward  objects,  and  turning  them  back  upon  the 
mind.  The  obstacles  to  Samadhi  are  mentioned 
in  the  next  Sutra,  I,  30,  as 

'Disease,  languor,  doubt,  carelessness,  idleness, 
worldliness,  error,  not  having  a  settled  standpoint, 
and  not  keeping  it ;  these  are  the  obstacles  causing 
unsteadiness  of  mind/ 

I,3i.  'With  them  arise  pain,  distress,  tremor 
of  limbs,  and  disturbance  of  the  regular  inbreathing 
and  outbreathing.' 

I,  32.  'To  prevent  all  this,  there  is  constant 
fixing  of  the  mind  on  one  subject  (Tattva).' 

I,  33.  'And  likewise  from  a  reviving  friendliness, 
pity,  complacency,  and  indifference  towards  objects 
of  happiness,  unhappiness,  virtue  and  vice,  there 
arises  serenity  of  mind.' 

The  commentator  adds,  '  If  one  sees  happy  people, 
one  should  not  envy  them  ;  if  one  sees  unhappiness, 
one  should  think  how  it  could  be  removed ;  if  one 
sees  virtuous  people,  one  should  rejoice  and  not  say, 
Are  they  really  virtuous  ?  if  one  sees  vicious  people, 
one  should  preserve  indifference,  and  show  neither 
approval  nor  aversion.  Thus  does  the  mind  become 
serene  and  capable  of  Samadhi.  But  all  these  are 
only  outward  helps  towards  fixing  the  mind  on  one 
subject,  and  of  thus  in  time  obtaining  Samadhi.' 

I  have  given  this  extract  in  order  to  show  how 
subordinate  a  position  is  occupied  in  Patafi^ali's 


WHAT    IS    ISVARA?  425 

mind  by  the  devotion  to  Isvara.  It  is  but  one  of 
the  many  means  for  steadying  the  mind,  and  thus 
realising  that  Viveka  or  discrimination  between 
the  true  man  (Purusha)  and  the  objective  world 
(Prakrit!).  This  remains  in  the  Yoga  as  it  was 
in  the  Sa?nkhya,  the  summum  bonum  of  mankind. 
I  do  not  think,  therefore,  that  Rajendralal  Mitra 
was  right  when  in  his  abstract  of  the  Yoga  (p.  lii) 
he  represented  this  belief  in  one  Supreme  God  as  the 
first  and  most  important  tenet  of  Pataf^ali's  philo- 
sophy. '  The  leading  tenets  of  the  Yogins,'  he  says, 
'  are  first,  that  there  is  a  Supreme  Godhead  who  is 
purely  spiritual,  or  all  soul,  perfectly  free  from 
afflictions,  works,  deserts,  and  desires.  His  symbol 
is  Om,  and  He  rewards  those  who  are  ardently 
devoted  to  Him  by  facilitating  their  attainment 
of  liberation ;  but  He  does  not  directly  grant  it. 
Nor  is  He  the  father,  creator,  or  protector  of  the 
universe,  with  which  He  is  absolutely  unconnected.' 

Rajendralal  Mitra  does  not  stand  alone  in  this 
opinion,  and  the  very  name  of  Sesvara-Samkhya, 
theistic  Samkhya,  given  to  the  Yoga,  would  seem 
to  speak  in  his  favour.  But  we  have  only  to  look 
at  the  Sutras  themselves  to  see  that  originally 
this  belief  in  a  personal  God  was  by  no  means 
looked  upon  as  the  most  characteristic  feature  of 
Patafk/ali's  system. 

Rajendralal  Mitra  is  right,  however,  in  stating 
the  tenet,  second  in  importance,  to  have  been  that 
there  are  countless  individual  souls  or  Purushas 
which  animate  living  beings,  and  are  eternal.  They 
are  pure  and  immutable ;  but  by  their  association 
with  the  universe  they  become  indirectly  the 
experiencers  of  joys  and  sorrows,  and  assume 


426  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

innumerable  embodied  forms   in   the    course  of  an 
ever-recurring  metempsychosis. 

The  Isvara,  with  the  Yogins,  was  originally  no 
more  than  one  of  the  many  souls,  or  rather  Selves  or 
Purushas,  but  one  that  has  never  been  associated  with 
or  implicated  in  metempsychosis,  supreme  in  every 
sense,  yet  of  the  same  kind  as  all  other  Purushas. 
The  idea  of  other  Purushas  obtaining  union  with  him 
could  therefore  never  have  entered  Pata?1(7ali's  head. 
According  to  him,  the  highest  object  of  the  Yogin 
was  freedom,  aloneness,  aloofness,  or  self-centred- 
ness.  As  one  of  the  useful  means  of  obtaining 
that  freedom,  or  of  quieting  the  mind  previous  to 
liberating  it  altogether,  devotion  to  the  Isvara  is 
mentioned,  but  again  as  one  only  out  of  many  means, 
and  not  even  as  the  most  efficacious  of  all.  In  the 
popular  atmosphere  of  India  this  belief  in  one 
Supreme  Being  may  have  been  a  strong  point 
in  favour  of  Patavk/ali's  system,  but  from  a  philo- 
sophical point  of  view,  Pataw/ali's  so-called  proofs 
of  the  existence  of  God  would  hardly  stand  against 
any  criticism.  They  are  mere  vrapepya,  or  side 
issues.  We  must  remember  that  Kapila  had 
committed  himself  to  no  more  than  that  it  is  im- 
possible to  prove  the  existence  of  Lvvara,  this  I-svara 
not  being  synonymous  with  God,  in  the  highest 
sense  of  the  word,  but  restricted  to  a  personal 
creator  and  ruler  of  the  world.  Such  a  confession 
of  an  inability  to  prove  the  existence  of  an  Isvara 
does  not  amount  to  atheism,  in  the  current  sense 
of  that  word,  and  thus  only  can  we  explain  the  fact 
that  Kapila  himself  was  considered  orthodox  by 
friends  and  foes.  In  the  Vedanta-philosophy  the 
question  of  the  real  existence  of  a  personal  Isvara 


WHAT    IS    ISVAKA?  427 

never  arises,  though  we  know  how  saturated  that 
philosophy  is  with  a  belief  in  the  existence  of 
Brahman,  the  absolute  Divine  Essence  of  which 
the  active  or  personal  Isvara  or  the  Lord  is  but 
a  passing  manifestation,  presented  by  Brahma, 
masc.,  a  mere  phase  of  Brahman,  neuter.  The 
Samkhya,  in  attempting  to  explain  the  universe, 
such  as  it  is,  both  in  its  subjective  and  objective 
character,  has  no  need  to  call  in  the  assistance  of 
a  personal  Lsvara.  What  we  mean  by  the  objective 
world  is,  according  to  Kapila,  the  work  or  out- 
come of  Prakrit  i,  when  animated  by  Purusha,  not 
of  Brahman.  His  system  is  therefore  without 
a  creator  or  personal  maker  of  the  world,  but 
if  we  called  it  therefore  atheistic,  we  should  have 
to  apply  the  same  name  to  Newton's  system  of 
the  world  and  Darwin's  theory  of  evolution,  though 
we  know  that  both  Newton  and  Darwin  were 
thoroughly  religious  men.  Darwin  himself  went 
so  far  as  to  maintain  most  distinctly  that  his 
system  of  nature  required  a  Creator  who  breathed 
life  into  it  in  the  beginning,  and  even  those  Dar- 
winians who  look  upon  this  admission  of  Darwin's 
as  a  mere  weakness  of  the  moment,  would  strongly 
object  to  be  called  irreligious  or  atheists.  Kapila 
might  easily  have  used  the  very  words  of  Darwin, 
and  this  is  very  much  what  Pataf^/ali  actually  did 
in  his  Yoga-Sutras.  His  supreme  Purusha,  after- 
wards raised  into  an  Adi-Purusha,  or  First  Being, 
satisfied  the  human  craving  after  a  First  Cause, 
and,  so  far  as  I  can  see,  it  was  this  natural  craving 
rather  than  any  vulgar  wish  to  curry  favour  with 
the  orthodox  party  in  India  that  led  to  Patan^ali's 
partial  separation  from  Kapila.  We  certainly  need 


428  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

not  suppose  that  the  recognition  of  Kapila's  ortho- 
doxy was  a  mere  contrivance  of  theological  diplo- 
macy on  the  part  of  the  Brahmans,  and  that  these 
defenders  of  the  faith  were  satisfied  with  an  in- 
sincere recognition  of  the  supreme  authority  of 
the  Vedas.  I  confess  that  with  what  we  know 
of  the  religious  life  of  India  and  the  character 
of  the  Brahmans  at  all  times,  it  seems  to  me  very 
difficult  to  admit  the  idea  of  such  a  compromise. 
Besides,  Kapila  appeals,  as  we  saw,  to  the  Veda  in 
good  earnest,  particularly  when  it  supports  his  own 
views,  as  in  V,  1 2,  when  he  wants  to  prove  'that  the 
world  arises  from  primitive  matter/  and  appeals  to 
the  Veda,  that  is,  to  such  passages  as  $vetasvatara 
Upanishad  IV,  5,  and  BHhad.  Ar.  Up.  I,  4,  7, 
that  can  be  made  to  support  his  view.  The  two 
oldest  representatives  of  the  Samkhya-philosophy, 
the  Tattva-samasa  and  the  Karikas  ',  do  not  even 
allude  to  the  difficulty  arising  from  the  Isvara 
question,  which  seems  to  me  an  important  argu- 
ment in  favour  of  their  antiquity.  The  charge 
of  atheism  became  more  popular  in  later  times, 
so  that  in  the  Padma-purana  the  charge  of  atheism 
is  brought  not  against  the  Sa??ikhya  only,  but 
against  the  Vaiseshika  and  Nyaya-philosophies  also, 
nay  even  against  the  Purva-Mima??isa.  Two  systems 
only  escape  this  charge,  the  Uttara-Mimamsa  and 
the  Yoga  ;  and  in  the  case  of  the  Uttara-Mimawzsa, 
its  explanation  by  $amkara  is  stigmatised  as  no 
better  than  Buddhism,  because  it  perverts  the 
meaning  of  passages  of  the  Veda,  which  teach  the 
identity  of  the  individual  soul  with  the  highest 

1  Hall,    Preface  to  Sawkhya-sara,   p.    39,    note,   and   Intro- 
duction to  Sawkhya-pravafcana. 


KAPILAS    REAL    ARGUMENTS.  429 

soul  (Brahman  without  qualities),  and  recommends 
the  surrender  of  good  works,  and  complete  indiffer- 
ence towards  this  world  and  the  next. 

Kapila's  Heal  Arguments. 

But  it  is  but  fair  that  we  should  hear  what 
Kapila  himself  has  to  say.  And  here  it  is  important 
again  to  observe  that  Kapila  does  not  make  a  point 
of  vehemently  denying  the  existence  of  an  Isvara,  but 
seems  likewise  to  have  been  brought  to  discuss  the 
subject,  as  it  were  by  the  way  only,  while  engaged 
in  discussing  the  nature  of  sensuous  perception 
(I,  89).  He  had  been  explaining  perception  as 
cognition  arising  from  actual  contact  between  the 
senses  and  their  respective  objects.  And  here  he 
is  stopped  by  the  inevitable  opponent  who  demurs 
to  this  definition  of  perception,  because  it  would 
not  include,  as  he  says,  the  perceptions  of  the 
Yogins.  Kapila  replies  that  these  visions  of  the 
Yogins  do  not  refer  to  external  objects,  and  that, 
without  denying  their  reality,  he  is  dealing  with 
the  perceptions  of  ordinary  mortals  only.  But  the 
controversy  does  not  end  here.  Another  opponent 
starts  up  and  maintains  that  Kapila's  definition  of 
perception  is  faulty,  or  at  all  events  not  wide  enough 
because  it  does  not  include  the  perception  of  the 
Isvara  or  Lord.  It  is  then  that  Kapila  turns  round 
on  his  opponent,  and  says  that  this  Isvara,  this, 
as  it  is  pretended,  perceptible  Isvara,  has  never 
been  proved  to  exist  at  all,  has  never  been  estab- 
lished by  any  of  the  three  legitimate  instruments 
of  knowledge  or  Prama/ias.  This  may  seem  to  us 
to  amount  to  a  denial  of  an  Isvara,  but  "V  i(//iana- 
Bhikshu  remarks  with  a  great  deal  of  truth,  that 


43°  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

if  Kapila  had  wished  to  deny  the  existence  of  God, 
he  would  have  said  Isvarabhavat,  and  not  Isvara- 
siddheA,  that  is,  because  Isvara  does  not  exist,  and 
not,  as  he  says,  because  Isvara  has  not  been  proved 
to  exist.  Anyhow  this  is  not  the  tone  of  a  philo- 
sopher who  wants  to  preach  atheism,  and  in  what 
follows  we  shall  see  that  it  is  the  manner  rather 
than  the  matter  of  the  proof  of  an  Isvara  which  is 
challenged  by  Kapila  and  defended  by  his  antagonist. 
Taking  his  stand  on  the  ground  that  the  highest 
blessedness  or  freedom  consists  in  having  renounced 
all  activity,  because  every  activity  presupposes 
some  kind  of  desire,  which  is  of  evil,  he  says  '  that 
every  proof  in  support  of  an  Isvara  as  a  maker 
or  Lord,  a  Sat-kara,  would  break  down.  For  if  he 
were  supposed  to  be  above  all  variance  and  free, 
he  could  not  have  willed  to  create  the  world ;  if  he 
were  not  so,  he  would  be  distracted  and  deluded 
and  unfit  for  the  supreme  task  of  an  fsvara.'  Then 
follows  a  more  powerful  objection,  based  on  the 
fact  that  the  Veda  speaks  of  an  Isvara  or  Lord, 
and  therefore  he  must  exist.  Kapila  does  not 
spurn  that  argument,  but,  as  he  has  recognised 
once  for  all  the  Veda  as  a  legitimate  source  of 
information,  he  endeavours  to  prove  that  the  Vedic 
passages  relied  on  in  support  of  the  existence  of  a 
maker  of  the  world,  have  a  different  purpose,  namely 
the  glorification  of  a  liberated  Self  or  Purusha,  or  of 
one  who  by  devotion  has  attained  supernatural 
power  (I,  95).  This  is  explained  by  Aniruddha  as 
referring  either  to  a  Self  •which  is  almost,  though 
not  altogether,  free,  because  if  altogether  free,  it 
could  have  no  desire,  nor  even  the  desire  of  creation  ; 
or  to  a  Yogin  who  by  devotion  has  obtained  super- 


KAPILAS    REAL    ARGUMENTS.  431 

natural  powers.  Vigwana-Bhikshu  goes  a  step  further, 
and  declares  that  it  refers  either  to  a  Self  that  has 
obtained  freedom  from  all  variance  and  disturbance, 
or  to  the  Self  that  is  and  has  remained  free  from 
all  eternity,  that  is,  to  the  Adi-purusha,  the  First 
Self,  who  in  the  theistic  Yoga-philosophy  takes  the 
place  of  the  Creator,  and  who  may,  for  all  we  know, 
have  been  the  origin  of  the  later  Purushottama. 

Aniruddha  thereupon  continues  that  it  might  be 
said  that  without  the  superintendence  of  some  such 
intelligent  being,  unintelligent  Prakn'ti  would  never 
have  acted.  But  this  also  he  rejects,  if  it  is  meant 
to  prove  the  existence  of  an  active  creator,  because 
the  superintendence  of  the  Purusha  of  the  Samkhyas 
over  PrakHti  is  not  an  active  one,  but  arises  simply 
from  proximity,  as  in  the  case  of  a  crystal  (I,  96). 
What  he  means  is  that  in  the  Samkhya  the  Purusha 
is  never  a  real  maker  or  an  agent.  He  simply 
reflects  on  Prakr^ti,  or  the  products  of  PrakHti 
are  reflected  on  him ;  and  as  anything  reflected 
in  a  crystal  or  a  mirror  seems  to  move  when  the 
mirror  is  moved,  though  it  remains  all  the  time 
quite  unmoved,  thus  the  Purusha  also  seems  to 
move  and  to  be  an  agent,  while  what  is  really 
moving,  changing,  or  being  created  is  PrakHti.  The 
Purusha  therefore  cannot  be  called  superintendent, 
as  if  exercising  an  active  influence  over  PrakHti, 
but  Prakriti  is  evolved  up  to  the  point  of  Manas 
under  the  eyes  of  Purusha,  and  the  Purusha  does 
no  more  than  witness  all  this,  wrongly  imagining 
all  the  time  that  he  is  himself  the  creator  or  ruler 
of  the  world.  In  support  of  this  Aniruddha  quotes 
a  passage  from  the  Bhagavad-gita  (III,  27):  'All 
emanations  of  Prakriti  are  operated  by  the  Gunas  ; 


432  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

but  the  Self  deluded  by  Ahamkara  imagines  that  he 
is  the  operator/ 

Another  objection  is  urged  against  the  Samkhya 
view  that  the  Purusha  is  not  a  doer  or  creator, 
namely  that,  in  that  case,  a  dead  body  also  might 
be  supposed  to  perform  the  act  of  eating.  But 
no,  he  says,  such  acts  are  performed  not  by  a  dead 
or  inactive  Atman,  as  little  as  a  dead  body  eats. 
It  is  the  individual  Purusha  (6riva)  that  performs 
such  acts,  when  under  the  influence  of  Prakn'ti 
(Buddhi,  Ahamkara,  and  Manas),  while  the  Atman 
or  Purusha  remains  for  ever  unchanged. 

A  last  attempt  is  made  to  disprove  the  neutrality 
or  non-activity  of  the  Atman,  that  is,  the  impossi- 
bility of  his  being  a  creator,  namely  the  uselessness 
of  teaching  anything,  supposing  the  Self  to  be 
altogether  without  cognition.  To  this  the  answer 
is  that  though  the  Atman  is  not  cognitive,  yet  the 
Manas  is.  The  Atman  reflects  on  the  Manas,  and 
hence  the  illusion  that  he  himself  cognises,  while 
in  reality  he  does  no  more  than  witness  the  appre- 
hension of  the  Manas.  Thus  when  it  is  said,  '  He  is 
omniscient  and  omnipotent,'  he  (in  spite  of  the 
gender)  is  meant  for  PrakHti,  as  developed  into 
Manas,  and  not  for  the  Purusha  who  in  reality  is 
a  mere  witness  of  such  omniscience  and  omnipotence 
(III,  56),  deluded,  for  a  time,  by  Prak?^ti. 

The  Theory  of  Karman. 

In  another  place  where  the  existence  of  an  Ls-vara, 
or  active  ruler  of  the  world,  is  once  more  discussed 
in  the  Sa??/khya-Sutras,  the  subject  is  again  treated 
not  so  much  for  its  own  sake,  as  in  order  to  settle 
the  old  question  of  the  continuous  effectiveness  of 


THE    THEORY   OF    KARMAN.  433 

works  (Karman).  The  reward  of  every  work  done, 
according  to  Kapila,  does  not  depend  on  any  ruler 
of  the  world ;  the  works  themselves  are  working 
on  for  evermore.  If  it  were  otherwise,  we  should 
have  to  ascribe  the  creation  of  the  world,  with  all 
its  suffering,  to  a  Lord  who  is  nevertheless  supposed 
to  be  loving  and  gracious. 

Madhava  in  his  Sarva-darsana-samgraha  (trans- 
lated by  Cowell  and  Gough,  p.  228)  uses  the  same 
argument,  saying :  '  As  for  the  doctrine  of  "  a 
Supreme  Being  who  acts  from  compassion,"  what  has 
been  proclaimed  by  beat  of  drum  by  the  advocates  of 
His  existence,  this  has  wellnigh  passed  away  out  of 
hearing,  since  the  hypothesis  fails  to  meet  either 
of  the  two  alternatives.  For  does  He  act  thus 
before  or  after  creation  ?  If  you  say  before,  we 
reply  that  as  pain  cannot  arise  in  the  absence  of 
bodies,  &c.,  there  will  be  no  need,  as  long  as  there 
is  no  creation,  for  any  desire  to  free  living  beings 
from  pain  (which  is  the  main  characteristic  of  com- 
passion) ;  and  if  you  adopt  the  second  alternative, 
you  will  be  reasoning  in  a  circle,  as  on  the  one 
hand  you  will  hold  that  God  created  the  world 
through  compassion,  and  on  the  other  hand  that 
He  compassionated  it  after  He  had  created  it.' 

And  again,  as  every  activity  presupposes  desire, 
the  Lord,  whether  working  for  Himself  or  for 
others,  would  ipso  facto  cease  to  be  free  from  de- 
sires. This  argument  is  examined  from  different 
points  of  view,  but  always  leads  to  the  same  result 
in  the  end  ;  that  is  to  say,  to  the  conviction  that 
the  highest  state  of  perfection  and  freedom  from  all 
conditions  is  really  far  higher  than  the  ordinary  con- 
ception of  the  status  of  the  popular  Hindu  deities, 

pf 


434  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

higher  even  than  that  of  an  Isvara,  if  conceived  as 
a  maker  and  ruler  of  the  universe.  This  concept 
of  the  liberated  Purusha  or  Atman  has  in  fact 
superseded  the  concept  of  the  Isvara,  and  to  have 
made  this  quite  clear  would  have  been,  on  the  part 
of  Kapila,  by  far  the  most  effective  defence  against 
the  charge  of  atheism.  The  conscience  of  Kapila 
and  of  the  ancient  Samkhyas  was  evidently  satisfied 
with  a  belief  in  a  Purusha  in  which  the  old  concepts 
of  the  divine  and  the  human  had  been  welded  into 
one,  without  claiming  even  the  aid  of  an  Adi-purusha, 
a  first  Purusha,  which  was  a  later  expedient. 

Nor  must  it  be  forgotten  that  other  philosophies 
also  besides  the  Sa?7ikhya  have  been  suspected  or 
openly  accused  of  atheism  for  the  same  reason.  It 
is  easy  to  understand  why  almost  every  philosophy, 
whether  Indian  or  European,  if  it  endeavours  to 
purify,  to  dehumanise,  and  to  exalt  the  idea  of  the 
Godhead,  can  hardly  avoid  the  suspicion  of  denying 
the  old  gods,  or  of  being  without  a  belief  in  the 
God  of  the  vulgar.  It  is  well  known  that  on  that 
ground  even  the  early  Christians  did  not  escape  the 
suspicion  of  atheism. 

Even  6raimini's  Purva-Mima/msa,  though  based  on 
the  belief  that  the  Veda  is  of  superhuman  origin, 
and  though  entirely  devoted  to  the  interpretation 
of  the  Vedic  sacrifice,  has  been  charged  with  atheism, 
because  it  admitted  the  independent  evolution  of 
works,  which  was  supposed  to  imply  a  denial  of 
God  ;  nor  did  the  Nyaya  and  Vai.seshika  systems,  as 
we  saw,  escape  the  same  suspicion.  It  may  be 
that  the  recognition  of  the  authority  of  the  Veda 
was  considered  sufficient  to  quiet  the  theological 
conscience  ;  but  there  is  certainly,  so  far  as  I  can 


THE    THEORY    OF    KARMAN.  435 

see,  no  passage  in  the  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika- Sutras 
where  an  tsvara  is  clearly  denied  or  postulated,  either 
as  the  author  or  as  the  controller  of  the  infinitesimally 
small  elements  or  atoms  of  which  the  world  is  by 
them  supposed  to  consist.  There  is  one  passage  in 
the  Nyaya-Sutras  in  which  the  question  of  a  divine 
Lord  is  discussed  in  the  usual  way,  namely  Book  V, 
Sutras  19-21,  but  otherwise  we  hear  nothing  of 
what  the  Isvara  is  meant  to  be  or  to  do. 

These  attacks,  as  met  by  the  Nyaya  philoso- 
phers, may  be  looked  upon  as  purely  academic,  but 
the  tone  in  which  they  are  met,  for  instance,  by  later 
philosophers  such  as  Madhava  in  his  Sarva-darsana- 
samgraha,  shows  that  they  at  all  events  took  them 
seriously.  As  specimens  of  Indian  casuistry  some 
extracts  from  Madhava's  chapter  on  the  Nyaya  may 
here  be  of  interest.  I  quote  from  the  translation  by 
Cowell  and  Gough  (p.  171):  'It  is  quite  true/  he 
says,  '  that  none  of  the  three  Prama^as  can  prove 
the  existence  of  a  Supreme  Being.  Perception 
cannot,  because  the  Deity,  being  devoid  of  form, 
must  be  beyond  the  senses.  Inference  cannot,  be- 
cause there  is  no  universal  proposition  or  middle 
term  that  could  apply.  The  Veda  cannot,  because 
we  Naiyayikas  have  ourselves  proved  it  to  be  non- 
eternal.  All  this  we  admit  to  be  quite  true,  that 
is,  we  admit  that  a  Supreme  Isvara  cannot  be 
established  by  proof.  But  is  there  not,  on  the  other 
side,  the  old  argument  that  the  mountains,  seas,  &c., 
must  have  had  a  maker,  because  they  possess  the 
nature  of  being  effects,  quite  as  much  as  a  jar  (or,  as 
we  should  say,  a  watch) "?  And  that  they  are  effects 
can  easily  be  proved  by  the  fact  that  they  possess 
parts,  these  parts  existing  in  intimate  relation,  and 

F  f  2 


436  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

again  by  the  fact  that  they  possess  a  limited 
magnitude  half-way  between  what  is  infinitely  great 
and  infinitesimally  small.  Nor  has  any  proof  ever 
been  produced  on  the  opposite  side  to  show  that 
the  mountains  had  no  maker.  For  if  any  one  should 
argue  that  the  mountains  cannot  have  had  a  maker 
because  they  were  not  produced  by  a  body,  just  as 
the  eternal  ether — this  pretended  inference  would 
no  more  stand  examination  than  the  young  fawn 
could  stand  the  attack  of  the  full-grown  lion,  for 
you  have  not  even  shown  that  what  you  say  about 
the  eternal  ether  is  a  real  fact.  We  therefore  abide 
by  our  old  argument  that  the  mountains  have  the 
nature  of  effects,  and  if  they  had  no  maker,  they 
could  not  be  effects,  that  is,  produced,  not  by  them- 
selves alone,  but  by  concurrent  causes,  one  of  them 
being  a  maker.  A  maker  is  a  being  possessed  of  a 
combination  of  volition,  desire  to  act,  a  knowledge  of 
proper  means,  setting  in  motion  all  other  causes,  but 
itself  moved  by  none  (the  Aristotelian  KIVOVV  CLKLV^TOV)' 
But  though  yielding  to  this  argument,  the  objector 
asks  next,  what  object  this  maker  or  Isvara  could 
have  had  in  view  in  creating  the  world.  A  feeling 
of  compassion,  if  he  had  any,  should  surely  have 
induced  him  to  create  all  living  beings  happy, 
and  not  laden  with  misery,  since  this  militates 
against  his  compassion.  Hence  he  concludes  that 
it  would  not  be  fitting  to  admit  that  God  created 
the  world.  Hereupon  the  Nyiiya  philosopher  be- 
comes very  wroth  and  exclaims  :  '  0  thou  crest-jewel 
of  the  atheistic  school,  be  pleased  to  close  for  a 
moment  thy  envy-dimmed  eyes,  and  to  consider 
the  following  suggestions.  His  action  in  creating 
is  indeed  caused  by  compassion  only,  but  the  idea 


THE    THEOEY    OF    KAKMAN.  437 

of  a  creation  which  shall  consist  of  nothing  but 
happiness  is  inconsistent  with  the  nature  of  things, 
since  there  cannot  but  arise  eventual  differences 
from  the  different  results  which  will  ripen  from  the 
good  and  evil  actions  (Karman)  of  the  beings  who 
are  to  be  created.' 

In  answer  to  this,  the  atheistic  opponent  returns 
once  more  to  the  authority  of  the  Veda  and  says  : 
'  But  then,  how  will  you  remedy  your  deadly  sick- 
ness of  reasoning  in  a  circle  [for  you  have  to  prove 
the  Veda  by  the  authority  of  God,  and  then  again 
God's  existence  by  the  Veda].' 

But  the  theistic  interpreter  and  defender  of  the 
Nyaya  is  not  silenced  so  easily,  and  replies  :  '  We 
defy  you  to  point  out  any  reasoning  in  a  circle  in 
our  argument.  Do  you  suspect  this  "reciprocal 
dependence  of  each  "  which  you  call  "  reasoning  in 
a  circle,"  in  regard  to  their  being  produced  or  in 
regard  to  their  being  known  ?  It  cannot  be  the 
former,  for  though  the  production  of  the  Veda  is 
dependent  on  God,  still  as  God  Himself  is  eternal, 
there  is  no  possibility  of  His  being  produced  ;  nor 
can  it  be  in  regard  to  their  being  known,  for  even 
if  our  knowledge  of  God  were  dependent  on  the 
Veda,  the  Veda  might  be  learned  from  some  other 
source  ;  nor,  again  can  it  be  in  regard  to  the  know- 
ledge of  the  non-eternity  of  the  Veda,  for  the 
non-eternity  of  the  Veda  is  easily  perceived  by 
any  Yogin  endowed  with  transcendent  faculties 
(Tivra,  &c.). 

Therefore,  when  God  has  been  rendered  propitious 
by  the  performance  of  duties  which  produce  His 
favour,  the  desired  end,  liberation,  is  obtained;  thus 
everything  is  clear.' 


438  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Everything  may  be  clear  to  one  accustomed  to 
the  Indian  way  of  arguing  ;  but  from  our  point  of 
view  it  would  certainly  seem  that,  though  the 
Nyaya  does  not  teach  the  non-existence  of  an 
Isvara,  it  is  not  very  successful  in  proving  by  its 
logic  the  necessity  of  admitting  a  maker  or  ruler 
of  the  world,  that  is,  an  Isvara. 

The  Four  Books  of  Yoga-Stltras. 

If  now  we  turn  to  the  Yoga-Sutras  of  Pataw/ali 
we  find  that  the  first  book,  the  Samadhi-pada,  is 
devoted  to  an  explanation  of  the  form  and  aim 
of  Yoga,  and  of  Samadhi,  meditation  or  absorption 
of  thought ;  the  second,  the  Sadhana-pada,  explains 
the  means  of  arriving  at  this  absorption ;  the  third, 
Vibhuti-pada,  gives  an  account  of  the  supernatural 
powers  that  can  be  obtained  by  absorption  and 
ascetic  exercises ;  while  the  fourth,  the  Kaivalya- 
pada,  explains  Kaivalya  to  be  the  highest  object 
of  all  these  exercises,  of  concentration  of  thought, 
and  of  deep  absorption  and  ecstasy.  Kaivalya,  from 
Kevala,  alone,  means  the  isolation  of  the  soul  from 
the  universe  and  its  return  to  itself,  and  not  to  any 
other  being,  whether  Isvara,  Brahman,  or  any  one 
else. 

That  this  is  the  riofht  view  of  the  case  is  confirmed 

O 

by  the  remarks  made  by  Vi^nana-Bhikshu  in  his 
Yoga-sara-sa?y/graha,  p.  18.  Here  we  are  told  that 
even  when  there  is  some  imperfection  in  the  employ- 
ment of  the  above  means  (faith,  energy,  memory, 
absorbing  meditation,  and  knowledge),  the  two 
results  (absorption  and  liberation)  can  be  brought 
very  near  by  the  grace  of  the  Parama-Isvara,  the 
Highest  Lord,  and  secured  by  devotion  to  Him. 


THE  FOUR  BOOKS  OF  YOGA-SUTRAS.       439 

By  Parama-lWara  or  the  Highest  Lord  is  here 
meant    that    particular    Purusha    (Self)   who    was 
never  touched  by  the  five  troubles,   nescience  and 
the   rest,   nor  by  virtue  or  vice  and  their  various 
developments,  or  by  any  residue  (results  of  former 
deeds)  in  general.     Vi^nana-Bhikshu  abstains  from 
saying  much  more  on  the  Lord,  because,  as  he  says, 
he    has    treated    of    this    Being    very   fully    in    his 
remarks    on  the  Brahma-Sutras  I,  i.     He  probably 
refers  to  his  commentary  on  the  Vedanta ;  and  he 
is  evidently  quite  convinced  that,  however  different 
the  roads  followed  by  the  Vedantins  and  Samkhya- 
yogins  may  be,  the  Divine  idea  of  both  schools  is 
much  the  same.     He  only  adds  that  the  powers  and 
omniscience  of  the  Isvara  are  equalled  or  excelled 
by  none,  that  he  is  the  spiritual  chief  and  father 
of    all    the    gods,    such   as    Brahma,   Vishnu,    and 
Hara,    that    he    imparts    spiritual    vision    (6r/lana- 
&akshus)   through    the  Vedas,  and   that   he    is   the 
inner  guide,  and  called  Pranava.     Devotion  to  Him 
is  said  to  consist  in  contemplation  and  to   end  in 
direct   perception.       Steadfastness    with    regard    to 
Isvara    is   represented    as    the    principal    factor    in 
abstract  meditation  and  in  liberation,  because  it  leads 
to   greater   nearness    to   the   final   goal,   steadiness 
with    regard    to    the   human    self  being    secondary 
only.     This  devotion  to  Isvara  is  also  declared  to 
put  an  end  to  all  the  impediments,  such  as  illness, 
&c.  (I,  30) ;  and  a  passage  is  quoted  from  the  Smn'ti, 
'  For  one  desiring  liberation   the  most  comfortable 
path  is  clinging  to  or  resting  on  Vishnu  ;  otherwise, 
thinking  only  with  the  mind,  a  man  is  sure  to  be 
deceived.' 


440  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

True  Object  of  Yoga. 

It  is  clear  throughout  the  whole  of  this  chapter  on 
Isvara  that  devotion  to  him  is  no  more  than  one  of 
the  means,  though,  it  may  he,  a  very  important  one, 
for  the  attainment  of  liberation,  the  highest  goal  of 
the  Yoga.  But  it  is  not  that  highest  goal  itself,  but 
only  a  means  towards  it,  nor  could  it  be  accepted 
as  the  most  important  feature  of  the  Yoga.  The 
really  important  character  of  the  Yoga  consists  in 
its  teaching  that,  however  true  the  Samkhya-philo- 
sophy  may  be,  it  fails  to  accomplish  its  end  without 
those  practical  helps  which  the  Yoga-philosophy 
alone  supplies.  The  human  mind,  though  fully 
enlightened  as  to  its  true  nature,  would  soon  be 
carried  away  again  by  the  torrent  of  life ;  the 
impressions  of  the  senses  and  all  the  cares  and 
troubles  of  every-day  life  would  return,  if  there 
were  no  means  of  making  the  mind  as  firm  as 
a  rock.  Now  this  steadying  of  the  mind,  this 
Yoga,  is  what  Pata/^ali  is  chiefly  concerned  with. 

7fltta. 

We  saw  that  in  the  second  Sutra  he  explained 
Yoga  as  Altta-vn'tti-nirodha,  that  is,  restraining 
or  steadying  the  actions  and  distractions  of  thought. 
Vritti,  which  I  translate  by  action,  has  also  been 
rendered  by  movement  or  function  ;  while  A"itta, 
which  T  give  as  thought,  has  often  been  trans- 
lated by  mind  or  the  thinking  principle.  It  is 
curious  that  the  Yoga  should  have  employed  a 
word  which,  as  far  as  I  know,  was  not  a  recog- 
nised technical  term  of  the  Sawkhya.  In  the 
Sa?ftkhya  the  term  would  be  Manas,  mind,  but 


.OTTA.  441 

Manas  in  a  state  of  activity,  and,  of  course,  as 
a  development  of  Ahamkara  and  Buddhi.  It  has 
to  be  taken  here  as  a  psychological  term,  as  a  name 
for  thought,  as  carried  on  in  real  life,  and  indirectly 
only  of  the  instrument  of  thought.  As  I  had  to 
use  mind  for  Manas  in  the  Samkhya-philosophy, 
it  would  be  difficult  to  find  a  better  rendering 
of  the  word  when  used  by  Yoga  philosophers.  Of 
course  Manas  is  always  different  from  Buddhi,  in  so 
far  as  it  is  a  modification  of  Buddhi,  which  itself  has 
passed  through  Ahamkara  or  the  differentiation  of 
subjectivity  and  objectivity.  But  for  practical  pur- 
poses, what  is  meant  by  Kitta,  is  simply  our  thought 
or  our  thinking,  and  though  mind,  with  us  also, 
has  been  defined  very  differently  by  different 
philosophers,  and  is  used  most  promiscuously  in 
common  parlance,  its  etymological  relationship  with 
Manas  pointed  it  out  as  the  most  convenient 
rendering  of  Manas,  provided  always  that  we 
remember  its  being  a  technical  term  of  the  Yoga- 
philosophy,  as  we  have  to  do  whenever  we  render 
Prakrtti  by  nature.  Nirodha,  restraint,  does  not 
mean  entire  suppression  of  all  movements  of  thought, 
but  at  first  concentration  only,  though  it  leads  in 
the  end  to  something  like  utter  vacuity  or  self- 
absorption.  In  all  the  functions  of  the  Manas,  it 
must  be  remembered  that  the  real  self-conscious 
seer  or  perceiver  is,  for  the  time  being,  the  Purusha 
or  Self.  It  is  he  who  is  temporarily  interested  in 
what  is  going  on,  though  not  absorbed  in  it  except 
by  a  delusion  only.  Like  the  moon  reflected  in  the 
ripples  of  the  waters,  the  Self  appears  as  moving 
in  the  waves  which  break  against  it  from  the  vast 

O 

ocean  of  Praknti,  but  in  reality  it  is  not  moving. 


44s  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

We  saw  that  the  mind,  when  receiving  impressions 
from  the  outer  world,  was  supposed  in  Hindu 
philosophy  to  assume  for  the  time  being  the  actual 
form  of  the  object  perceived,  but,  when  once  perfect 
in  Yoga,  it  perceives  nothing  but  itself. 

Functions  of  the  Mind. 

The  principal  acts  and  functions  of  the  mind  are 
described  as  right  notion,  wrong  notion,  fancy, 
sleep,  and  remembering,  and  they  may  be  either 
painful  or  not. 

Right  notions  are  brought  about  by  the  three  Pra- 
ma^as,  so  well  known  from  different  systems  of 
Indian  philosophy,  as  sensuous  perception,  inference, 
and  testimony,  Vedic  or  otherwise.  It  is  significant 
that  Pata?l^ali  should  have  used  Agama  instead  of 
the  Aptava&ana  of  the  S4??ikhya,  for  Agama  means 
distinctly  the  Veda,  and  thus  would  establish  once 
for  all  what  is  called  the  orthodox  character  of 
the  Yoga. 

Wrong  notions  require  no  explanation.  They 
are  illustrated  by  our  mistaking  mother-of-pearl 
for  silver,  a  rope  for  a  snake,  &c.  A  state  of  doubt 
also  when  we  are  uncertain  whether  what  we  see 
at  a  distance  is  a  man  or  the  trunk  of  tree,  is  classed 
among  wrong  notions. 

Fancy  is  explained  as  chiefly  due  to  words  ;  and 
a  curious  instance  of  fancy  is  given  when  we  speak 
of  the  intelligence  of  the  Self  or  Purusha,  or  of  the 
head  of  llahu.  the  fact  being1  that  there  is  no  in- 

o 

telligence  belonging  to  Self,  but  that  the  Self  is 
altogether  intelligence,  just  as  llahu,  the  monster 
that  is  supposed  to  swallow  the  moon,  is  not  a  being 
that  has  a  head,  but  is  a  head  and  nothing  else. 


EXERCISES.  443 

Sleep  is  defined  as  that  state  (Vritti)  of  the  mind 
which  has  nothing  for  its  object.  The  commentator, 
however,  explains  that  in  sleep  also  a  kind  of  per- 
ception must  take  place,  because,  otherwise,  we  could 
not  say  that  we  had  slept  well  or  badly. 

Remembering  is  the  not  wiping  out  of  an  object 
that  has  once  been  perceived.  While  true  per- 
ception, false  perception,  and  fancy  take  place  in 
a  waking  state,  a  dream,  which  is  a  perception  of 
vivid  impressions,  takes  place  in  sleep,  while  sleep 
itself  has  no  perceptible  object.  Remembering  may 
depend  on  true  or  false  perceptions,  on  fancy,  and 
even  on  dreams. 

Exercises. 

Now  all  these  actions  or  functions  have  to  be 
restrained,  and  in  the  end  to  be  suppressed,  and  this 
is  said  to  be  effected  by  exercises  (Abhyasa)  and 
freedom  from  passions  (Vairagya),  I,  12. 

Indian  philosophers  have  the  excellent  habit  of 
always  explaining  the  meaning  of  their  technical 
terms.  Having  introduced  for  the  first  time  the 
terms  exercise  and  freedom  from  passion,  Patafk/ali 
asks  at  once  :  '  What  is  Abhyasa  or  exercise  ? ' 
Abhyasa  is  generally  used  in  the  sense  of  repetition, 
but  he  answers  that  he  means  hereafter  to  use  this 
term  in  the  sense  of  effort  towards  steadiness  (Sthiti) 
of  thought.  And  if  it  be  asked  what  is  meant  by 
steadiness  or  Sthiti,  he  declares  that  it  means  that 
state  of  the  mind,  when,  free  from  all  activity  (V ritti), 
it  remains  in  its  own  character,  that  is,  unchanged. 
Such  effort  must  be  continuous  or  repeated,  as 
implied  by  the  term  Abhyasa  (I,  13). 


444  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

This  Abhyasa  is  said  to  become  firmly  grounded, 
if  practised  for  a  long  time  thoroughly  and  un- 
intermittingly  (I,  14). 

Dispassion,  Vairagya. 

Next  follows  the  definition  of  dispassion(  Vairagya), 
as  the  consciousness  of  having  overcome  (the  world) 
on  the  part  of  one  who  has  no  longer  any  desire  for 
any  objects  whatsoever,  whether  visible  or  revealed 

a,  is). 

Here  visible  (DHshte)  stands  for  perceptible  or 
sensuous  objects,  while  Anusravika  may  be  translated 
by  revealed,  as  it  is  derived  from  Anusrava,  and 
this  is  identical  with  /S'ruti  or  Veda.  Perhaps  Anu- 
srava  is  more  general  than  Veda,  including  all  that 
has  been  handed  down,  such  as  the  stories  about  the 
happiness  of  the  gods  in  paradise  (Devaloka).  &c. 
The  consciousness  of  having  subdued  or  overcome 
all  such  desires  and  being  no  longer  the  slave  of 
them,  that,  we  are  told,  is  Vairagya  or  dispassionate- 
ness, and  that  is  the  highest  point  which  the  student 
of  Yoga-philosophy  hopes  to  reach. 

It  is  interesting  to  see  how  deeply  this  idea  of 
Vairagya  or  dispassionateness  must  have  entered 
into  the  daily  life  of  the  Hindus.  It  is  constantly 
mentioned  as  the  highest  excellence  not  for  ascetics 
only,  but  for  everybody.  It  sometimes  does  not 
mean  much  more  than  what  we  mean  by  the  even 
and  subdued  temper  of  the  true  gentleman,  but  it 
signifies  also  the  highest  unworldliness  and  a  com- 
plete surrender  of  all  selfish  desires.  A  very  good 
description  of  what  Vairagya  is  or  ought  to  be  is 
preserved  to  us  in  the  hundred  verses  ascribed  to 
Bhartnhari  (650  A.  D.),  which  are  preceded  by  two 


DISPASSION,    VAIRAGYA.  445 

other  centuries  of  verses,  one  on  worldly  wisdom 
and  the  other  on  love.  Many  of  these  verses  occur 
again  and  again  in  other  works,  and  it  is  very 
doubtful  whether  BhartHhari  was  really  the  original 
author  of  them  all,  or  whether  he  only  collected 
them  as  Subhashitas  \  Anyhow  they  show  how  the 
philosophy  of  Vairagya  had  leavened  the  popular 
mind  of  India  at  that  distant  time,  nor  has  it  ceased 
to  do  so  to  the  present  day.  It  was  perhaps  bold, 
after  Bhartn'hari,  to  undertake  a  similar  collection 
of  verses  on  the  same  subject.  But  as  the  Vairagya- 
sataka  of  (rainaMrya  seems  in  more  recent  times 
to  have  acquired  considerable  popularity  in  India, 
a  few  extracts  from  it  may  serve  to  show  that  the 
old  teaching  of  Pataw/ali  and  Bhartn'hari  has  not 
yet  been  forgotten  in  their  native  country. 

'  Death  follows  man  like  a  shadow,  and  pursues 
him  like  an  enemy  ;  perform,  therefore,  good  deeds, 
so  that  you  may  reap  a  blessing  hereafter.' 

'  Frequent  enjoyment  of  earthly  prosperity  has 
led  to  your  sufferings.  Pity  it  is  that  you  have  not 
tried  the  "  Know  Yourself."  ' 

'  Live  in  the  world  but  be  not  of  it,  is  the  precept 
taught  by  our  old  Bishis,  and  it  is  the  only  means 
of  liberating  yourself  from  the  world.' 

'  The  body  is  perishable  and  transitory,  while  the 
Self  is  imperishable  and  everlasting  ;  it  is  connected 
with  the  body  only  by  the  link  of  Karman ;  it 
should  not  be  subservient  to  it.' 

'  If,  through  sheer  negligence,  you  do  nothing  good 


1  His  work  is  actually  called  Subhashita-trisati,  see 
Eeport  of  Sanskrit  and  Tamil  MSS.,  1896-97,  by  Seshagiri 
£astri,  p.  7. 


44^  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

for  your  fellow  creatures,  you  will  be  your  own  enemy, 
and  become  a  victim  to  the  miseries  of  this  world.' 

'  Better  to  do  less  good,  with  purity  of  heart,  than 
to  do  more  with  jealousy,  pride,  malice,  or  fraud. 
Little,  but  good  and  loving  work,  is  always  valuable, 
like  a  pure  gem,  the  essence  of  a  drug,  or  pithy 
advice.' 

'  If  you  are  unable  to  subject  yourself  physically 
to  penances,  to  undergo  austerities,  and  engage  in 
deep  contemplation,  the  proper  course  to  liberate 
your  soul  from  the  hard  fetters  of  Karman  would 
be  to  keep  the  passions  of  your  heart  under  control, 
to  check  your  desires,  to  carry  out  your  secular  affairs 
with  calmness,  to  devote  yourself  to  the  worship  of 
God,  and  to  realise  in  yourself  the  "  Permanent 
Truth,"  bearing  in  mind  the  transitory  nature  of  the 
universe.' 

'To  control  your  mind,  speech,  and  body,  does 
not  mean  to  be  thoughtless,  silent  or  inactive,  like 
beasts  or  trees;  but,  instead  of  thinking  what  is 
evil,  speaking  untruth,  and  doing  harm  to  others, 
mind,  speech,  and  body  should  be  applied  to  good 
thoughts,  good  words,  and  good  deeds.' 

Dispassionateness,  as  here  taught  for  practical 
purposes  chiefly,  reaches  its  highest  point  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Yoga-philosopher,  when  a  man,  after  he 
has  attained  to  the  knowledge  of  Purusha,  has  freed 
himself  entirely  from  all  desire  for  the  three  Gimas 
(or  their  products).  This  is  at  least  what  Patu/i/yali 
says  in  a  somewhat  obscure  Sutra  (I,  ii)1.  This 
Sutra  seems  intended  to  describe  the  highest 

c"> 

state  within  reach  of  the  true  VairiUnn,  involving1 

O  c* 

1  Garbe,  Grundriss,  p.  49. 


MEDITATION    WITH    OR    WITHOUT    AN    OBJECT.        447 

indifference  not  only  to  visible  and  revealed  objects, 
but  likewise  towards  the  Gimas,  that  is,  if  I  am 
not  mistaken,  the  twenty-four  Tattvas,  here  called 
Guwas  J,  because  determined  by  them.  The  know- 
ledge of  the  Purusha  implies  the  distinction  between 
what  is  Purusha,  the  Self,  and  what  is  not,  and  there- 
fore also  between  Purusha  and  the  Gunas  of  Prakr^ti. 
Vigrnana-Bhikshu  explains  it  by  Atmanatmavive- 
kasakshatkarat,  i.  e.  from  realising  the  difference 
between  what  is  Self  and  what  is  not  Self,  and 
not  as  a  possessive  compound  :  the  sense,  however, 
remaining  much  the  same.  It  is  curious  that 
Rajendralal  Mitra  should  have  rendered  Purusha- 
khyate^  by  '  conducive  to  a  knowledge  of  God.' 
From  a  purely  philosophical  point  of  view  Purusha 
may  be  translated  by  God,  but  such  a  translation 
would  be  misleading  here,  particularly  as  the 
Sutra  23,  on  the  devotion  to  the  Lord,  follows  so 
soon  after.  It  would  have  been  better  also  to 
translate  '  arising  from,'  than  '  conducive  to.' 

Meditation  With  or  Without  an  Object. 

Pataw/ali  next  proceeds  (1, 1 7)  to  explain  an  impor- 
tant distinction  between  the  two  kinds  of  meditative 
absorption  (Samadhi),  which  he  calls  Sampra^nata 


1  These  Guwas  are  more  fully  described  in  II,  19,  where  we 
read  that  the  four  Guwas  or  Guwaparvam  are  meant  for  (i) 
Visesha,  i.e.  the  gross  elements  and  the  organs ;  (2)  Avisesha. 
i.e.  the  subtle  elements  and  the  mind;  (3)  the  Liwgamatra,  i.e. 
Buddhi ;  (4)  the  Aliwga,  i.e.  Praknti  as  Avyakta,  In  the  com- 
mentary to  I,  45,  the  same  classes  of  Gvmas  are  described  as 
Aliwga,  a  name  of  Pradhana,  Visishfaliwga,  the  gross  elements 
(Bhutani) ;  AvisisbJalimga,  the  subtle  essences  and  the  senses  : 
Liwgamatra,  i.  e.  Buddhi,  and  Aliwga,  that  is,  the  Pradhana. 


448  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  Asampra<7?iata.  This  seems  to  mean  that  there 
is  one  kind  of  meditation  when  our  thoughts  are 
directed  and  fixed  on  a  definite  object,  and  another 
when  there  is  no  definite  object  of  meditation  left. 
Here  the  spirit  of  minute  distinction  shows  itself 
once  more,  for  though  these  two  kinds  of  meditation 
may  well  be  kept  apart,  and  the  former  be  considered 
as  preliminary  to  the  latter,  the  numerous  sub- 
divisions of  each  hardly  deserve  our  notice.  We  are 
told  that  what  is  called  conscious  meditation  may 
have  for  its  object  either  one  or  the  other  of  the 
twenty-four  Tattvas  or  the  Isvara,  looked  upon  as 
one  of  the  Purushas.  The  twenty-four  Tattvas  are 
called  unconscious,  the  twenty-fifth  or  Purusha  is 
conscious.  When  meditation  (Bhavana)  has  something 
definite  for  its  object  it  is  called  not  only  Pra^/iata, 
known,  or,  as  referred  to  the  subject,  knowing,  but 
also  Savi^a,  literally  with  a  seed,  which  I  am  inclined 
to  take  in  the  sense  of  having  some  seed  on  which 
it  can  fix,  and  from  which  it  can  develop.  The 
Asampra^rtata-samadhi,  or  meditation  without  a 
known  object,  is  called  Avi(/a,  not  having  a  seed 
from  which  to  spring  or  to  expand.  Native  com- 
mentators, however,  take  a  different  view. 

Those  who  in  their  Samadhi  do  not  go  beyond 
the  twenty-four  Tattvas,  without  seeing  the  twenty- 
fifth,  the  Purusha,  but  at  all  events  identify  them- 
selves no  longer  with  the  body,  are  called  Videhas, 
bodyless  ;  others  who  do  not  see  the  Purusha 
yet,  but  only  existence,  are  called  Prakwtilayas, 
absorbed  in  Prakf'iti. 

This  again  is  not  quite  clear  to  me,  but  it  is 
hardly  necessary  that  we  should  enter  into  all  the 
intricate  subdivisions  of  the  two  kinds  of  meditation, 


MEDITATION    WITH    OR    WITHOUT    AN    OBJECT.        449 

such  as  Savitarka,  argumentative,  Savi&ara,  delibera- 
tive, Sananda,  joyous,  and  Sasmitil l,  with  false  con- 
ceit. They  may  become  important  in  a  more  minute 
study  of  the  Yoga,  but  they  can  hardly  be  of 
interest  to  speculative  philosophers  except  so  far 
as  they  furnish  another  proof  of  a  long  continued 
study  of  the  Yoga-philosophy  in  India  before  the 
actual  composition  of  the  Sutras. 

The  Asamprae^ata-samadhi,  or  meditation  with- 
out a  known  object,  or,  it  may  be,  unconscious 
meditation,  is  explained  as  being  preceded  by  a 
repetition  of  negative  perception,  and  as  the  end 
of  all  previous  impressions.  I,  18. 

This  Sutra  has  been  differently  explained  by 
different  European  and  native  commentators.  It 
may  mean  that  there  is  a  residue  of  previous 
impressions,  or  that  there  is  not.  The  Sawskaras, 
which  I  have  rendered  by  previous  impressions, 
are  everything  that  has  given  to  the  mind  its 
peculiar  character,  its  flavour,  so  to  say,  or  its 
general  disposition, 

'Quo  semel  est  imbuta  recens  servabit  odorem 
Testa  diu.' 

It  may  be  intended  that  these  Sawiskaras  are  either 
all  wiped  out,  or  that  there  is  but  a  small  residue  of 
them,  manifested  in  the  final  act  of  the  stopping  all 
functions  of  the  mind. 

In  summing  up  what  has  been  said  about  the 
different  kinds  of  Samadhi,  Pata?"k/ali  says  (I,  1 9)  once 
more  that  in  the  case  of  the  Videhas  and  Prakviti- 


3  Asmita  is  different  from  Ahawkara,  and  means  the  mis- 
conception that  I  am  (Asmi)  what  I  am  not,  such  as  Prakn'ti, 
Buddhi,  Ahamkara,  Manas,  &c. 

Gg 


45°  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

layas  (as  explained  before,  p.  448)  the  object  or,  if 
you  like,  the  cause  of  Samadhi  is  the  real  world 
(Bhava),  but  that  for  other  Yogins  there  are  pre- 
liminary conditions  or  steps  to  Samadhi,  namely, 
faith,  energy,  memory,  concentration,  and  know- 
ledge succeeding  each  other.  Every  one  of  these 
Samadhis  is  again  carefully  defined,  and  some  more 
helps  are  mentioned  in  the  next  Sutra  (I,  21), 
where  we  read  that  Samadhi  may  be  said  to 
be  near  or  within  reach  when  the  zeal  or  the  will  is 
strong.  These  strong-willed  or  determined  aspirants 
are  again  divided  (I,  22)  according  as  the  means 
employed  by  them  are  mild,  moderate,  or  excessive. 
Thus  we  get  nine  classes  of  Yogins,  those  who 
employ  mild  means,  with  mild,  with  moderate,  or  with 
excessive  zeal ;  those  who  employ  moderate  means, 
with  mild,  with  moderate,  or  with  excessive  zeal ;  and 
those  who  employ  excessive  means  with  mild,  with 
moderate,  or  with  excessive  zeal. 

Such  divisions  and  subdivisions  which  fully  justify 
the  name  of  Samkhya,  enumeration,  make  both  the 
Samkhya-  and  Yoga-philosophies  extremely  tedious, 
and  I  shall  in  future  dispense  with  them,  though 
they  may  contain  now  and  then  some  interesting 
observations. 

tsvara  Once  More. 

After  an  enumeration  of  all  these  means  of  Yoga 
to  be  employed  by  the  student,  follows  at  last  the 
famous  Sutra  I,  23,  which  has  always  been  supposed 
to  contain,  in  answer  to  Kapila,  the  proof  of  the 
existence  of  a  Deity,  and  which  I  translated  before 
by  '  Devotion  to  the  Lord.'  The  commentator  calls 
it  simply  an  easy  expedient,  an  alternative.  Nor  is 
it  right,  with  liajendralal  Mitra,  to  translate  this 


OTHER    MEANS    OF    OBTAINING    SAMADHI.  451 

Sutra  at  once  by  '  Devotion  to  God.'  Isvara,  as  we 
saw,  is  not  God  in  the  sense  in  which  Brahm^  might 
be  called  so.  He  is  a  God,  the  highest  God,  but 
always  one  of  many  Purushas ;  and  though  he  was 
looked  upon  as  holy  (I,  25)  and  omniscient,  he  never 
seems  to  have  risen  to  the  rank  of  a  Creator,  for 
which  there  is  really  no  room  in  the  Samkhya 
system.  Though  it  is  true,  no  doubt,  that  the 
orthodox  Yogins  derived  great  comfort  from  this 
Sutra  as  shielding  Patan^ali  against  the  charge  of 
atheism,  it  would  be  impossible  to  look  upon  it  as 
a  real  proof  in  support  of  the  existence  of  God,  or 
as  more  than  a  somewhat  forced  confession  of  faith. 

Other  Means  of  Obtaining  Samadhi. 

The  benefits  arising  from  this  devotion  to  the 
Lord  are  not  essentially  different  from  those  that 
are  to  be  obtained  from  other  Upayas  or  means  of 
attaining  Samadhi,  as  may  be  seen  from  Sutras  I,  29 
to  I,  33  translated  before.  Nor  is  this  devotion 
even  the  last  or  the  highest  Upaya,  for  Patark/ali 
goes  on  immediately  after  to  mention  other  means 
equally  conducive  to  concentrated  meditation  or 
absorption  in  the  thought  of  one  object.  Expedients, 
such  as  the  expulsion  and  retention  of  the  breath, 
follow  next,  the  so-called  Pranayamas,  which  we 
can  well  believe,  may  have  been  really  useful  as 
contrivances  to  draw  away  the  thoughts  from  all 
subjects  except  the  one  chosen  for  meditation, 
generally  one  of  the  Tattvas.  But  this  opens  far 
too  large  a  subject  for  our  purpose  in  this  place. 
We  approach  here  to  the  pathological  portion  of 
the  Yoga,  the  so-called  Ha^a  or  Kriya-yoga,  a  sub- 
ject certainly  far  more  important  than  has  generally 

Gg  2 


452  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

been  supposed,  but  a  subject  for  students  of  path- 
ology rather  than  of  philosophy,  unless,  as  is  now 
the  fashion,  we  include  the  so-called  physico-psycho- 
logical  experiments  under  the  name  of  philosophy. 
One  thing  may  certainly  be  claimed  for  our  Sutras  ; 
they  are  honest  in  their  statements  as  to  the 
discipline  that  can  be  applied  to  the  mind  through 
the  body,  and  even  if  they  could  be  proved  to  have 
been  mistaken  in  their  observations,  their  illusions 
do  not  seem  to  me  to  have  been  mere  frauds,  at 
least  in  the  days  of  Pata?l(/ali,  though  it  is  far  from 
my  purpose  to  undertake  a  defence  of  all  the  doings 
and  sayings  of  modern  Yogins  or  Mahatmans. 

Next  to  the  moderation  or  restraint  of  the  breath- 
ing, follow  descriptions  of  how  the  mind,  by  being 
directed  to  the  tip  of  the  nose,  cognises  a  heavenly 
odour,  and  the  same  with  all  the  other  senses,  which 
therefore  are  supposed  to  have  no  longer  any  inclina- 
tion towards  outward  objects,  having  everything 
they  want  in  themselves.  We  are  next  told  of  the 
perception  of  an  inward  luminous  and  blessed  state, 
which  produces  a  steadiness  and  contentedness  of 
the  mind  when  directed  towards  objects  which  no 
longer  appeal  to  the  passions  (I,  37).  No  wonder 
that  even  objects  seen  in  dreams  or  in  sleep  are 
supposed  to  answer  the  same  purpose,  that  is,  to  fix 
the  attention.  In  fact  any  object  may  be  chosen  for 
steady  meditation,  such  as  the  moon  without,  or  our 
heart  within,  provided  always  that  these  objects  do 
not  appeal  to  our  passions. 

All  these  are  means  towards  an  end,  and  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  they  have  proved  efficacious  ; 
only,  as  so  often  happens,  the  means  have  evidently 
encroached  in  this  case  also,  on  the  aims,  and  to  such 


OTHER    MEANS    OF    OBTAINING    SAMADHI.  453 

an  extent  that  Yoga  has  often  been  understood  to 
consist  in  these  outward  efforts  rather  than  in  that 
concentration  of  thought  which  they  were  meant 
to  produce,  and  which  was  to  lead  on  to  Kaivalya 
or  spiritual  separateness  and  freedom.  This  true 
Yoga  is  often  distinguished  as  Ra^a-yoga  or  royal 
Yoga  from  the  other  called  Kriya-yoga  or  work- 
ing Yoga,  which  is  sometimes  called  Ha£Aa-yoga, 
though  it  is  not  clear  why.  Though  some  of  these 
bodily  exercises  are  represented  as  serving  as  a  kind 
of  staircase  on  which  the  mind  ascends  step  by  step, 
we  are  told  at  other  times  that  any  step  may  be 
useful,  and  that  some  may  be  skipped  or  taken  for 
passed. 

Now,  if  we  ask  what  is  the  result  of  all  this,  we 
are  told  in  Sutra  41  that  a  man  who  has  put  an 
end  to  all  the  motions  and  emotions  of  his  mind, 
obtains  with  regard  to  all  objects  of  his  senses  con- 
formation grounded  in  them  (sic),  or  steadiness  and 
consubstantiation,  the  idea  being  that  the  mind  is 
actually  modified  or  changed  by  the  objects  per- 
ceived (I,  41).  As  a  crystal,  when  placed  near  a 
red  flower,  becomes  really  red  to  our  eyes,  in  the 
same  way  the  mind  is  supposed  to  become  tinged 
by  the  objects  perceived.  This  impression  remains 
true  as  grounded  in  the  object,  and  our  mind  should 
always  be  centred  on  one  object  of  meditation. 

Having  mentioned  in  a  former  Sutra  that  Samadhi 
(here  called  Samapatti)  may  be  either  Savitarka  or 
SaviMra,  he  now  explains  (I,  42)  that  when  medita- 
tion is  mixed  with  uncertainties  as  to  word,  meaning, 
or  knowledge,  it  is  called  Savitarka.  Thus,  supposing 
that  our  meditation  was  centred  on  a  cow,  the  question 
would  be  whether  we  should  meditate  on  the  sound 


454  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

cow,  Sk.  Go,  or  on  the  meaning  of  it  (Begriff),  that 
is  the  genus  cow,  or  the  idea  or  picture  (Vorstellung) 
conveyed  by  it.  Such  a  meditation  would  be  called 
Savitarka.  Its  opposite  is  Nirvitarka  when  all 
memory  vanishes  and  the  meaning  alone,  without 
any  form,  remains,  or,  as  the  commentator  puts  it, 
though  not  much  more  clearly,  when  the  knowing 
mind  (Pragma),  tinged  with  the  form  of  its  object, 
forgets  its  own  subjective  form  of  knowing,  and 
becomes,  as  it  were,  one  in  form  with  the  object. 

After  Samadhi,  both  Savitarka  and  Nirvitarka, 
has  been  described,  the  next  division  is  into  Savi&ara 
and  NirviMra.  They  are  defined  as  having  reference 
to  subtle  objects  (I,  44),  that  is,  to  the  Tanmatras, 
essences,  and  the  senses,  and  thus  we  learn  that  the 
former,  the  Savitarka  Samadhi,  had  to  deal  with 
material  objects  only.  Subtle  objects  include  Pra- 
k-riti  also,  and  there  is  nothing  subtle  beyond  it,  for 
the  Purusha  is  neither  subtle  nor  non- subtle. 

If  we  look  upon  the  NirviMra  Samadhi  as  the 
highest  of  the  Samadhis,  then  there  would  follow 
on  the  completion  of  that  meditation  contentment  or 
peace  of  the  Self  (Atman).  Knowledge  in  this  state 
is  called  Tfo'tambhara,  right  or  truth-bearing,  quite 
different  from  the  knowledge  which  is  acquired  by 
inference  or  by  revelation.  And  from  this  know- 
ledge springs  a  disposition  which  overcomes  all 
former  dispositions  and  renders  them  superfluous. 

Samadhi  Aprar/uatft. 

This  knowledge  therefore  would  seem  to  be  the 
highest  goal  of  the  true  Yogin  ;  but  no,  there  is 
still  something  beyond  knowledge,  and  that  is  what 
was  called  before  Apragr/iat&  Samadhi,  meditation 


KAIVALYA,    FREEDOM.  455 

without  any  object,  or  pure  ecstasy.  This  restores 
the  Purusha  to  his  own  nature,  after  he  has  been 
delivered  from  all  the  outside  disturbances  of  life, 
and  particularly  from  the  ignorance  that  caused  him 
to  identify  himself  for  awhile  with  any  of  the  works 
of  Prakrit i  (Asmita). 

Kaivalya,  Freedom. 

This  short  account  of  what  is  contained  in  the 
first  chapter  of  the  Yoga-Sutras  contains  almost 
all  that  can  be  of  interest  to  European  philosophers 
in  the  system  of  Patan^ali,  and  it  is  not  impossible 
that  it  may  have  originally  formed  a  book  complete 
in  itself.  It  shows  us  the  whole  drift  of  the  Yoga 
in  its  simplest  form,  beginning  with  the  means  of 
steadying  and  concentrating  the  mind  on  certain 
things,  and  more  particularly  on  the  twenty-four 
Tattvas,  as  taken  over  from  the  Samkhya,  and 
leading  on  to  a  description  of  meditation,  no  longer 
restricted  to  any  of  the  Tattvas,  which  is  tantamount 
to  a  meditation  which  does  not  dwell  on  anything 
that  can  be  offered  by  an  ideal  representation  of  what 
is  called  the  real  world.  It  is  really  meditation  of 
each  Purusha  on  himself  only,  as  distinct  from  all  the 
Tattvas  of  Praknti.  This  is  Kaivalya  or  the  highest 
bliss  in  the  eyes  of  the  true  Yogin,  and  it  may  well 
be  called  the  highest  achievement  of  6rfiana-yoga, 
i.  e.  Yoga  carried  on  by  thought  or  by  the  will  alone. 
Outward  helps,  such  as  the  Pranayama,  the  in-  and 
out-breathing,  are  just  alluded  to,  but  that  is  almost 
the  only  allusion  to  what  in  later  times  came  to  be 
the  most  prominent  part  of  the  practical  or  Kriya- 
yoga,  namely,  the  postures  and  other  ascetic  per- 
formances (Yogahgas),  supposed  to  prepare  the  mind 


456  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

for  its  own  higher  efforts.  The  above-mentioned 
Isvara-pramdh4na,  '  Devotion  to  the  Lord/  is  classed 
here  as  simply  one  of  the  Yogangas  or  accessories 
of  Yoga,  together  with  purification,  contentment, 
penance,  and  mumbling  of  prayers  (II,  32),  showing 
how  little  of  real  philosophical  importance  was 
ascribed  to  it  by  Patafk/ali.  It  helps  towards  Sa- 
madhi,  meditation,  it  is  a  kind  of  worship  (Bhakti- 
visesha)  addressed  to  Bhagavat ;  but  that  is  all  the 
commentator  has  to  say  in  recommendation  of  it. 
There  is  nothing  to  show  that  Patafi^/ali  imagined 
he  had  thereby  given  a  full  and  satisfactory  answer 
to  the  most  momentous  of  all  questions,  the  exist- 
ence or  non-existence  of  an  individual  Creator  or 
Ruler  of  the  world. 

It  is  quite  possible  that  some  of  my  readers  will, 
be  disappointed  by  my  having  suppressed  fuller 
details  about  these  matters,  but  it  seems  to  me 
that  they  really  have  nothing  to  do  with  philosophy 
in  the  true  sense  of  the  word ;  and  those  who  take 
an  interest  in  them  may  easily  consult  texts  of 
which  there  exist  English  translations,  such  as  the 
second  and  third  books  of  the  Yoga-Sutras,  and 
better  still  the  Ha^aprayoga,  translated  by  Shrinivas 
Jyangar,  Bombay,  1893  ;  On  the  Vedantic  Haj-Yoga, 
by  Sabhapati  Svami,  edited  by  Siris  Chandra  Basu, 
Lahore,  1880;  the  Ghera/<c/a-samhita,  Bombay,  1895, 
and  several  more.  There  is  also  a  very  useful  German 
translation  by  H.  Walter,  '  Svatmarama's  Ha^Aa- 
yoga-pradipika,  Mimchen,  1893. 

Yogangas,  Helps  to  Yoga. 

It  is  true  that  considerable  antiquity  is  claimed 
for  some  of  these  Yogangas,  or  members  of  Yoga. 


YOGANGAS,  HELPS  TO  YOGA.          457 

Siva,  himself  is  reported  to  have  been  their  author, 
and  names  such  as  Vasish^Aa  and  Ya^navalkya  are 
quoted  as  having  described  and  sanctioned  eighty- 
four  postures,  while  Gorakshanatha  reckoned  their 
true  number  as  8,400,000 J.  I  take  a  few  specimens 
from  Eajendralal  Mitra's  Yoga  Aphorisms,  p.  103  :— 
'  i .  Padmasana.  The  right  foot  should  be  placed 
on  the  left  thigh,  and  the  left  foot  on  the  right 
thigh  ;  the  hands  should  be  crossed,  and  the  two 
great  toes  should  be  firmly  held  thereby  ;  the  chin 
should  be  bent  down  on  the  chest,  and  in  this 
posture  the  eyes  should  be  directed  to  the  tip  of 
the  nose.  It  is  called  Padmasana,  lotus-seat,  and 
is  highly  beneficial  in  overcoming  all  diseases. 

2.  Virasana.      Place  each  foot  under  the   thigh 
of  its  side,  and  it  will  produce  the  heroic  posture 
Virasana. 

3.  Bhadrasana.     Place  the  hands  in  the  form  of 
a  tortoise  in  front  of  the  scrotum,  and  under  the 
feet,  and  there  is  Bhadrasana,  fortunate-seat. 

4.  Svastikasana.      Sitting  straight  with  the  feet 
placed  under  the  (opposite)  thighs  is  called  Svastika- 
sana, cross-seat. 

5.  Danc/asana.     Seated  with  the  fingers  grasping 
the  ankles  brought  together  and  with  feet  placed 
extended  on  the  legs,  stick-seat.' 

This  will,  I  believe,  be  considered  enough  and 
more  than  enough,  and  I  shall  abstain  from  giving 
descriptions  of  the  Mudras  (dispositions  of  upper 
limbs),  of  the  Bandhas  or  bindings,  and  of  the  rules 
regarding  the  age,  sex,  caste,  food  and  dwelling 
of  the  performer  of  Yoga.  To  most  people  these 

1  See  Eajendralal  Mitra,  Yoga  Aphorisms,  p.  102. 


458  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

minute  regulations  will  seem  utterly  absurd.  I  do 
not  go  quite  so  far,  for  some  of  these  facts  have,  in 
a  general  way,  been  recorded  and  verified  so  often 
that  we  can  hardly  doubt  that  these  postures  and 
restraints  of  breathing,  if  properly  practised,  are 
helpful  in  producing  complete  abstraction  (Pratya- 
hara)  of  the  senses  from  their  objects,  and  a  com- 
plete indifference  of  the  Yogin  towards  pain  and 
pleasure,  cold  and  heat,  hunger  and  thirst ].  This 
is  what  is  meant  by  the  complete  subjugation  of 
the  senses  (Param&  vasyatS,  indriy4?^im,  II,  55) 
which  it  is  the  highest  desire  of  the  Yogin  to  realise, 
and  this  not  for  its  own  sake,  but  as  an  essential 
condition  of  perceiving  the  difference  between  the 
Purusha,  the  seer,  and  PrakHti,  the  spectacle,  pre- 
sented to  Purusha  through  the  agency  of  the  Manas 
as  developed  from  Prakriti.  Professional  students 
of  hypnotism  would  probably  be  able  to  account  for 
many  statements  of  the  followers  of  Kriya-yoga, 
which  to  a  reader  without  physiological  knowledge 
seem  simply  absurd  and  incredible. 

Vibhdtis,  Powers. 

The  third  chapter  of  Pata/lr/ali's  Yoga-Sutras  is 
devoted  to  a  description  of  certain  powers  which 
were  supposed  to  be  obtainable  by  the  Yogin. 
They  are  called  Vibhutis,  or  simply  Bhutis,  Maha- 
siddhis,  Jfo'ddhis,  or  Aisvaryas.  Here  also  we  are 
able  to  watch  the  transition  from  rational  begin- 
nings to  irrational  exaggerations,  the  same  tendency 
which  led  from  intellectual  to  practical  Yoga.  That 
transition  is  clearly  indicated  in  the  Yogangas  or 


Cf.  N.  C.  Paul,  Yoga-Philosophy. 


SAM  YAM  A    AND    SIDDHIS.  459 

accessories  of  Yoga.  In  II,  29  we  find  eight  of 
these  accessories  mentioned,  viz.  restraints  (Yama), 
subduing  (Niyama),  postures  (Asana),  regulation  of 
breathing  (Pranayama),  abstraction  (Praty4hara), 
firmness  (Dharana),  contemplation  (Dhyana),  and 
absorption  (Samadhi),  but  in  III,  4  three  only  are 
chosen  as  constituting  Samyama,  firmness,  namely 
DharaTia,  Dhyana,  arid  Samadhi,  the  other  five 
being  treated  as  merely  outward  helps.  Dharawa, 
firmness  in  holding,  is  explained  (III,  i)  as  the 
confinement  of  the  Manas  to  one  place,  and  this 
place  is  said  to  be  the  tip  of  the  nose,  the  navel, 
the  ether,  the  sky  or  some  other  place.  By  this  all 
other  VHttis  or  motions  of  the  Manas  are  stopped, 
and  the  mind  can  be  kept  fixed  on  one  object.  The 
next,  Dhyana,  is  contemplation  of  the  one  object  to 
the  exclusion  of  all  others  ;  while  the  third,  real 
Samadhi,  absorption,  arises  when  the  mind,  lost  in 
its  work,  illuminates  one  object  only.  This  Sa- 
madhi, of  which  absorption  or  meditation  is  a  very 
poor  rendering,  is  explained  etymologically  as  that 
by  which  the  mind,  Samyag  adhiyate,  is  thoroughly 
collected  and  fixed  on  one  point  without  any  dis- 
turbing causes  (III,  3). 

Sawyama  and  Siddhis. 

The  Samyama,  which  comprises  the  three  highest 
helps  to  Yoga,  is  called  internal  (III,  7)  in  contra- 
distinction from  the  other  helps,  but,  in  itself,  it  is 
still  but  an  outside  help  of  the  so-called  objectless 
(Nirvi^a)  state  (III,  8).  It  is  difficult  to  find  a 
word  for  Samyama,  firm  grasp  being  no  more  than 
an  approximative  rendering.  It  is  this  Sawiyama, 
however,  which  leads  on  to  the  Siddhis,  or  perfections. 


460  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

These  are  at  first  by  no  means  miraculous,  though 
they  become  so  afterwards,  nor  are  they  the  last  and 
highest  goal  of  Yoga-philosophy,  as  has  often  been 
supposed  both  by  Indian  and  by  European  scholars. 
Patafw/ali,  before  explaining  these  Siddhis,  endeavours 
to  show  that  every  thing  exists  in  three  forms,  as 
not  yet,  as  now,  and  as  no  more,  and  that  it  is 
possible  from  knowing  one  to  know  the  other  states. 
Thus  a  jar  is  not  yet,  when  it  exists  only  as  clay ; 
it  is  now,  when  it  is  the  visible  jar,  and  it  is  no 
more,  when  it  has  been  broken  up  and  reduced  to 
dust  again.  So  in  all  things,  it  is  said,  the  future 
may  be  known  from  the  present  and  the  present 
accounted  for  by  the  past.  This  is  expressed  by 
Pataf^ali  in  Sutra  III,  16.  So  far  all  is  clear  ;  but 
it  is  difficult  to  see  why  Samyama  is  required  for 
this,  and  how  it  is  to  be  applied  to  what  is  called 
the  threefold  modification.  Knowledge  of  the  past 
from  the  present,  or  of  the  future  from  the  present, 
is  hardly  miraculous  yet ;  though,  when  we  are  told 
that  a  Yogin  by  means  of  Sa??iyama  knows  what  is 
to  come  and  what  is  past,  it  sounds  very  much  like 
a  claim  of  the  gift  of  prophecy,  and  certainly  became 
so  in  time.  The  same  applies  in  a  still  higher 
degree  to  the  achievements  by  means  of  Sawyama 
claimed  by  the  Yogins  in  the  following  Svltras.  Here 
(III,  i  7)  because  a  man  has  learned  to  understand 
the  meanings  and  percepts  indicated  by  words,  a 
Yogin  by  applying  Sawyama  to  this  gift,  is  supposed 
to  be  able  to  understand  the  language  of  birds  and 
other  animals.  In  fact  we  get  more  and  more  into 
superstitions,  by  no  means  without  parallels  in  other 
countries,  but  for  all  that,  superstitions  which  have 
little  claim  on  the  attention  of  the  philosopher,  how- 


SAMYAMA    AND    SIDDHIS.  461 

ever  interesting  they  may  appear  to  the  pathologist. 
Then  follow  other  miraculous  gifts  all  ascribed  to 
Samyama,  such  as  a  knowledge  of  former  existences, 
a  knowledge  of  another's  mind,  or  thought-reading, 
though  not  of  the  merely  casual  objects  of  his  thoughts, 
a  power  of  making  oneself  invisible,  a  fore-knowledge 
of  one's  death,  sometimes  indicated  by  portents. 
By  Samyama  with  respect  to  kindness,  a  man  may 
make  himself  beloved  by  everybody.  This  is  again 
natural,  but  soon  after  we  are  landed  once  more  in 
the  supernatural,  when  we  are  told  that  he  may 
acquire  the  strength  of  an  elephant,  may  see  things 
invisible  to  ordinary  eyes,  may,  by  meditating  on  the 
sun,  acquire  a  knowledge  of  geography,  by  meditating 
on  the  moon,  a  knowledge  of  astronomy,  by  medi- 
tating on  the  Polar  star,  a  knowledge  of  the  move- 
ments of  the  heavenly  bodies,  and  by  meditating 
on  the  navel,  a  knowledge  of  anatomy.  He  may 
actually  suppress  the  feelings  of  hunger  and  thirst, 
he  may  acquire  firmness,  see  heavenly  visions,  in  fact 
know  everything,  if  only  he  can  bring  his  will  or  his 
Sawyama  to  bear  on  the  things  which  produce  such 
effects.  More  of  these  Siddhis  are  mentioned  from 
IV,  38  to  49,  such  as  the  soul  entering  another 
body,  ascension  to  the  sky,  effulgence,  unlimited 
hearing,  lightness  like  that  of  cotton,  conquest  of 
all  elements,  conquest  of  the  organs,  conquest  of 
time,  omniscience,  &c.  These  matters,  though 
trivial,  could  not  be  passed  over,  whether  we  accept 
them  as  mere  hallucinations  to  which,  as  we  know, 
our  senses  and  our  thinking  organ  are  liable,  or 
whether  we  try  to  account  for  them  in  any  other 
way.  They  form  an  essential  part  of  the  Yoga-philo- 
sophy, and  it  is  certainly  noteworthy,  even  from  a 


462  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

philosophical  point  of  view,  that  we  find  such  vague 
and  incredible  statements  side  by  side  with  specimens 
of  the  most  exact  reasoning  and  careful  observation. 

Miracles. 

In  reading  the  accounts  of  the  miracles  performed 
by  Yogins  in  India  we  have  in  fact  the  same  feeling 
of  wonderment  which  we  have  in  reading  of  the 
miracles  performed  by  the  Neo-platonists  in  Alex- 
andria. The  same  writer  who  can  enter  into  the 
most  abstruse  questions  of  philosophy1  will  tell  us 
with  perfect  good  faith  how  he  saw  his  master 
sitting  in  the  air  so  many  feet  above  the  ground. 
One  instance  of  the  miracles  supposed  to  have  been 
wrought  by  a  Yogin  in  India  must  suffice.  A 
writer  with  whom  I  have  been  in  correspondence, 
the  author  of  a  short  life  of  his  teacher,  Sabhapati 
Svamy,  born  in  Madras  in  1840,  relates  not  only 
visions  which  the  young  student  had — these  might 
be  accounted  for  like  other  visions — but  miracles 
which  he  performed  in  the  presence  of  many  people. 
We  are  told  that  it  was  in  the  twenty-ninth  year 
of  his  age  that  Sabhapati,  thirsting  for  Brahma^/Mna 
or  knowledge  of  Brahman,  had  a  vision  of  the 
Infinite  Spirit,  who  said  to  him  :  '  Know,  0  Sabha- 
pati, that  I  the  Infinite  Spirit  am  in  all  creations, 
and  all  the  creations  are  in  me.  You  are  not 
separate  from  me,  neither  is  any  soul  distinct  from 
me  :  I  reveal  this  directly  to  you,  because  I  see  that 
you  are  holy  and  sincere.  I  accept  you  as  my  dis- 
ciple, and  bid  you  rise  and  go  to  the  Agastya  A.sTama, 
where  you  will  find  me  in  the  shape  of  Rishis  and 

1  M.  M.,  Theosophy,  Lcct.  xiii. 


MIRACLES.  463 

Yogins.'  After  that,  in  the  dead  of  the  night,  for 
it  was  one  o'clock  in  the  morning  when  he  saw  the 
divine  vision,  Sabhapati  left  his  wife  and  two  sons, 
went  out  of  his  house  and  travelled  all  the  night 
till  he  reached  the  temple  of  Mahadeva,  also  called 
Vedasrem-Svayambhu-sthalam,  seven  miles  from 
Madras.  There  he  sat  for  three  days  and  three 
nights  immured  in  deep  contemplation,  and  was  again 
commanded  in  a  vision  to  proceed  to  the  Agastya 
Asrama.  After  many  perils  he  at  last  reached  that 
Asrama  and  found  there,  in  a  large  cave,  a  great 
Yogin,  two  hundred  years  old,  his  face  benign  and 
shining  with  divinity.  The  Yogin  had  been  expect- 
ing him  ever  since  Mahadeva  had  commanded  him 
to  proceed  to  the  Agastya  Asrama.  He  became  his 
pupil,  acquired  Brahmagwana  and  practised  Samadhi 
till  he  could  sit  several  days  without  any  food. 
After  seven  years  his  Guru  dismissed  him  with 
words  that  sound  strange  in  the  mouth  of  a  miracle- 
monger  :  '  Go  my  son,  and  try  to  do  good  to  the 
world  by  revealing  the  truths  which  thou  hast 
learned  from  me.  Be  liberal  in  imparting  the  truths 
that  should  benefit  the  GHhasthas  (householders). 
But  beware  lest  thy  vanity  or  the  importunity  of 
the  world  lead  thee  to  perform  miracles  and  show 
wonders  to  the  profane.'  Sabhapati  seems  after- 
wards to  have  taught  in  some  of  the  principal  cities 
and  to  have  published  several  books,  declining,  how- 
ever, to  perform  any  miracles.  In  1880  he  was 
still  living  at  Lahore.  But  though  he  himself 
declined  to  perform  any  of  the  ordinary  miracles,  he 
has  left  us  an  account  of  a  miracle  performed  by  one 
of  the  former  members  of  his  own  Asrama.  About  i  So 
years  ago  a  Yogin  passed  through  Mysore  and  visited 


464  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 


the  R£j  ah  who  received  him  with  great  reverence 
and  hospitality.  Meanwhile  the  Nabob  of  Arcot 
paid  a  visit  to  Mysore,  and  they  all  went  with  the 
Yogin  to  his  Asrama.  The  Nabob,  being  a  Mussul- 
man, asked  :  '  What  power  have  you  that  you 
arrogate  to  yourself  divine  honour,  and  what  have 
you  that  you  call  yourselves  divine  persons  ?  '  A 
Yogin  answered,  'Yes,  we  possess  the  full  divine 
power  to  do  all  that  God  can  do  ;  '  and  the  Yogin 
took  a  stick,  gave  divine  power  to  it,  and  threw 
it  in  the  sky.  The  stick  was  transformed  into 
millions  of  arrows,  and  cut  down  the  branches  of 
the  fruit  trees  to  pieces,  thunder  began  to  roar  in 
the  air,  and  lightning  began  to  flash,  a  deep  dark- 
ness spread  over  the  land,  clouds  overcast  the  sky, 
and  rain  began  to  fall  in  torrents.  Destruction  was 
impending  ;  and  in  the  midst  of  this  conflict  of  the 
elements,  the  voice  of  the  Yogin  was  heard  to  say  : 
'  If  I  give  more  power,  the  world  will  be  in  ruins.' 
The  people  implored  the  Yogin  to  calm  this  universal 
havoc.  He  willed,  and  the  tempest  and  the  thunder, 
and  the  rain  and  the  wind,  and  the  fire  and  all  were 
stopped,  and  the  sky  was  as  serene  and  calm  as 
ever  V 

I  do  not  say  that  the  evidence  here  adduced  would 
pass  muster  in  a  Court  of  Law.  All  that  strikes 
me  in  it  is  the  simplicity  with  which  everything  is 
told,  and  the  unhesitating  conviction  on  the  part  of 
those  who  relate  all  this.  Of  course,  we  know  that 
such  things  as  the  miracle  here  related  are  impos- 


1  Om,  a  treatise  on  Vedantic  Raj  Yoga  Philosophy,  by  the 
Mahatma  Giana  Guroo  Yogi  Sabhapati  Sovarni,  edited  by  Siris 
Chandra  Basu,  Student,  Government  College,  Lahore,  1880. 


MIRACLES.  465 

sible,  but  it  seems  almost  as  great  a  miracle  in 
human  nature  that  such  things  should  ever  have 
been  believed,  and  should  still  continue  to  be  be- 
lieved. This  belief  in  miracles  evidently  began  with 
small  beginnings,  with  what  Pata^ali  describes  as 
a  foretelling  of  the  future  by  a  knowledge  of  the 
present  or  the  past.  What  could  be  foretold  might 
soon  be  accepted  as  the  work  of  the  prophet  who 
foretold  it,  and  from  prophecy  even  of  recurrent 
events,  there  is  but  a  step  to  prophesying  other 
events  also,  whether  wished  for,  feared,  or  expected. 
Prophets  would  soon  begin  to  outbid  prophets,  and 
the  small  ball  of  superstition  would  roll  on  rapidly 
till  it  became  the  avalanche  which  we  know  it  to  be, 
and  to  have  been  at  all  times  and  in  all  countries. 

Apart  from  that,  however,  we  must  also  remember 
that  the  influence  of  the  mind  on  the  body  and  of 
the  body  on  the  mind  is  as  yet  but  half  explored ; 
and  in  India  and  among  the  Yogins  we  certainly 
meet,  particularly  in  more  modern  times,  with  many 
indications  that  hypnotic  states  are  produced  by 
artificial  means  and  interpreted  as  due  to  an  inter- 
ference of  supernatural  powers  in  the  events  of 
ordinary  life.  But  all  this  is  beyond  our  province, 
however  interesting  it  may  be  to  modern  psycho- 
logists, and  it  was  only  in  order  to  guard  against 
being  supposed  to  be  unwilling  even  to  listen  to 
the  statements  of  those  who  believe  in  Kriyayoga 
that  I  have  given  so  much  space  to  what  I  cannot 
help  considering  as  self-deception,  leading  in  many 
cases  to  a  systematic  deception  of  others. 

Yoga,  in  its  early  stages,  knew  little  or  nothing 
of  all  this.  It  was  truly  philosophical,  and  the 
chief  object  it  had  in  view  was  to  realise  the  dis- 

Hh 


466  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

tinction  between  the  experiencer  and  the  experienced, 
or  as  we  should  call  it,  between  subject  and  object. 
We  are  told  again  and  again  that  our  ordinary, 
though  false,  experience  arises  from  our  not  dis- 
tinguishing between  these  two  heterogeneous  factors 
of  our  consciousness,  and  Yoga,  when  perfect,  repre- 
sented the  achievement  of  this  distinction,  the  sepa- 
ration or  deliverance  of  the  subject  from  all  that  is 
or  ever  was  objective  in  him  ;  the  truth  being  that 
the  Purusha  never  can  be  the  immediate  experiencer 
or  perceiver  of  pain  or  pleasure,  but  can  only  see 
them  as  being  reflected  on  the  Manas  or  mind,  this 
mind  not  being,  in  truth,  his,  the  Purusha's,  but 
simply  the  working  of  Prakn'ti,  the  ever  objective. 
In  enumerating  the  means  by  which  this  distinction 
can  be  realised,  Patafw/ali  always  gives  the  prefer- 
ence to  efforts  of  thought  over  those  of  the  flesh. 
If  he  does  not  discard  the  latter  altogether, 
we  ought  to  remember  that  only  by  practical 
experiments  could  we  possibly  gain  the  right  to 
reject  them  altogether. 

True  Yoga. 

But  though  Patam/ali  allows  all  these  postures 
and  tortures  as  steps  towards  reaching  complete 
abstraction  and  concentration  of  thought,  he  never 
forgets  his  highest  object,  nay  he  allows  that  all 
the  Siddhis,  or  miraculous  powers,  claimed  by  the 
Yogins,  are  useless  and  may  even  become  hindrances 
(III,  37)  in  the  career  of  the  true  aspirant  after 
Viveka,  distinction,  Moksha,  freedom,  and  Kaivalya, 
aloneness.  One  sometimes  doubts  whether  all  the 
Sutras  can  really  be  the  work  of  one  and  the  same 
mind.  Thus  while  in  the  course  of  Patangrali's 


TRUE    YOGA.  467 

speculations,  we  could  not  but  give  him  credit  for 
never  trying  to  locate  the  mind  or  the  act  of  per- 
ceiving and  conceiving  in  the  brain,  or  in  some- 
thing like  the  pineal  gland,  we  find  him  suddenly 
in  III,  34,  claiming  the  muscle  of  the  heart  as 
the  seat  of  the  consciousness  of  thought  (HHdaye 
7ifittasa?nvit).  While  the  human  body  as  such  is 
always  regarded  as  dark  and  as  unclean,  so  that 
the  Yogin  shrinks  from  contact  with  his  own,  much 
more  from  contact  with  other  bodies,  we  are  sud- 
denly told  (III,  46)  that  by  Samyama  or  restraint, 
colour,  loveliness,  strength  and  adamantine  firm- 
ness may  be  gained  for  the  body. 

However,  the  general  drift  of  the  Yoga  remains 
always  the  same,  it  is  to  serve  as  a  Taraka  (III,  54), 
as  a  ferry,  across  the  ocean  of  the  world,  as  a  light 
by  which  to  recognise  the  true  independence  of  the 
subject  from  any  object ;  and  as  a  preparation  for 
this,  it  is  to  serve  as  a  discipline  for  subduing  all  the 
passions  arising  from  worldly  surroundings.  In  the 
last  Sutra  of  the  third  book,  Patan^ali  sums  up 
what  he  has  said  by  a  pregnant  sentence  (III,  55)  : 
'  Kaivalya  (aloneness)  is  achieved  when  both  the 
mind  and  the  Self  have  obtained  the  same  purity.' 
This  requires  some  explanation.  Instead  of  Mind, 
Pata%/ali  says  simply  Sattva,  which  the  commen- 
tator renders  by  A'ittasattva,  and  defines  as  the 
entering  of  thought  (Jiitta)  into  its  own  causal 
form,  after  the  removal  of  the  misconception  of 
activity.  This  seems  not  quite  exact,  for  if  we 
took  Sattva  as  the  Guna,  Sattva,  we  should  be  told 
that  a  Guna  cannot  have  a  cause,  while  the  Manas 
has  a  cause,  and  is  to  be  reabsorbed  into  its  cause 
or  causes  (Ahamkara,  Bnddhi,  Prakrit!) ,  as  soon  as 

H  h  2 


468  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

its  Guna,  here  the   Sattva,   has   become   perfectly 
*Santa  or  quieted. 

The  Three  Gums. 

I  have  tried  to  explain  the  meaning  of  the  three 
Gu?ias  before,  but  I  am  bound  to  confess  that  their 
nature  is  by  no  means  clear  to  me,  while,  unfor- 
tunately, to  Indian  philosophers  they  seem  to  be  so 
clear  as  to  require  no  explanation  at  all.  We  are 
always  told  that  the  three  Gu«as  are  not  qualities, 
but  something  substantial  (Dravyam).  In  every- 
thing that  springs  from  nature,  and  therefore  in  the 
Manas  also,  there  are  these  three  Gu?ias  (IV,  15) 
striving  for  mastery  l.  Sattva  of  the  mind  is  good- 
ness, light,  joy,  and  its  purification  means  its  not 
being  overcome  by  the  other  two  Gu^as  of  Ra^as, 
passion,  or  Tamas,  darkness  (II,  47).  From  this 
purification  springs  first  Saumanasya,  serenity,  from 
this  Ekagrata,  concentration,  from  this  Indriya- 
r/aya,  subjugation  of  the  organs  of  sense,  and  from 
this  at  last  Atmadar-sanayogyata,  fitness  for  be- 
holding the  Self,  or  in  the  case  of  the  Purusha,  fit- 
ness for  beholding  himself,  which  is  the  same  as 
Kaivalya,  aloneness. 

In  the  fourth  and  last  chapter  Patafw/ali  recurs 
once  more  to  the  Siddhis,  perfections,  natural  or 
miraculous,  and  tells  us  that  they  may  be  due  not 
only  to  Samadhi,  meditation  in  its  various  forms,  but 
also  to  birth,  to  drugs,  to  incantations,  and  to  heat 


1  Yatharthas  trigunas  tatha  A'ittam  api  triguwam,  'As  the 
object  is  threefold,  the  thought  also  is  threefold.'  The  mind  in 
fact  is  doubly  affected  by  the  Gimas,  first  as  having  thorn  or 
being  them,  then  as  being  tinged  once  more  by  the  Gunas  of 
the  objects  perceived  (IV,  16). 


SAMSKARAS    AND    VASANAS.  469 

(Tapas)  or  ardour  of  asceticism,  &c.  By  birth  is 
meant  not  only  birth  in  this  or  in  a  future  life,  as 
a  Brahman  or  /Sudra,  but  also  rebirth,  such  as  when 
Nandisvara,  a  Brahman,  became  a  Deva,  or  when 
Visvamitra,  from  being  a  Kshatriya,  became  by 
penance  a  Brahman.  This  is  accounted  for  as  being 
simply  a  removal  of  hindrances,  as  when  a  husband- 
man, wishing  to  irrigate  his  field,  pierces  the  balk  of 
earth  that  kept  the  water  from  flowing  in. 

Sawskaras  and  Vasanas. 

Though,  as  a  rule,  whatever  a  man  does  has  its 
results,  whether  good  or  bad,  the  act  of  a  Yogin,  we 
are  told,  is  neither  black  nor  white,  it  produces  no 
fruit,  because  it  is  performed  without  any  desire. 

As  the  results  of  actions  we  have  Vasanas,  im- 
pressions, or  Samskaras,  dispositions.  They  show 
themselves  either  in  what  remains,  often  dormant, 
and  is  then  called  memory  l,  or  in  the  peculiar  genus, 
of  man,  bird,  cow,  Brahman  or  /Sudra,  in  the  locality 
and  in  the  time  when  a  man  is  born.  These  re- 
mainders never  cease,  so  that  the  animal  pro- 
pensities may  lie  dormant  for  a  time  in  a  Brahman, 
but  break  out  again  when  he  enters  on  a  canine 
birth.  They  are  not  said  to  be  without  beginning, 
because  desires  and  fears  can  only  arise  when  there 
are  objects  to  be  feared  or  desired  (IV,  10).  Impres- 
sions are  caused  by  perceptions,  perceptions  spring 
from  desire,  desire  from  nescience.  The  result  of 
them  all  is  the  body  with  its  instincts,  their  habitat 
the  mind,  their  support,  or  that  on  which  they  lean, 

1  This  kind  of  memory  comes  very  near  to  what  we  call 
instinct,  propensity,  or  untaught  ability. 


470  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  same  as  the  support  of  perception,  i.  e.  the 
objective  world.  Hence  it  is  said  that  they  sprout, 
like  seeds,  but  that  by  Knowledge  and  Yoga  they 
can  be  annihilated  also  like  seeds,  when  roasted.  In 
connexion  with  this  the  question  is  discussed,  how 
anything  can  ever  be  completely  destroyed,  how 
what  exists  can  be  made  not  to  exist,  and  how  what 
does  not  exist  can  be  made  to  exist.  I  doubt,  how- 
ever, whether  Rajendralal  Mitra  can  be  right  (III, 
9,  IV,  12)  when  he  discovers  here  something  like 
the  theory  of  ideas  or  logoi  in  the  mind  of  Patafi<?ali, 
and  holds  that  the  three  ways  or  Adhvans  in  which 
objects  present  themselves  to  the  mind,  or  affect  the 
mind,  as  past,  present  and  future,  correspond  to  the 
admission  ofuniversalia  ante  rem,  the  ideas  or  types, 
the  universalia  in  re,  the  essence,  and  the  univer- 
salia  post  rem,  the  concepts  in  our  minds.  I  confess 
I  hardly  understand  his  meaning.  It  should  never 
be  forgotten  that  the  mind  is  taken  by  Patafl(/ali  as 
by  itself  unconscious  (not  as  Svilbhasa,  self-illumi- 
nated, IV,  1 8)  and  as  becoming  conscious  and  intelli- 
gent for  a  time  only  by  the  union  between  it  and 
the  Purusha,  who  is  pure  intelligence.  The  Manas 
only  receives  the  consciousness  of  perception  which 
conies  in  reality  from  the  Purusha,  so  that  here  we 
should  have  the  etymological,  though  somewhat  fanci- 
ful, definition  of  consciousness  (con-scientia)  as  well 
as  of  the  Sanskrit  Saw-vid,  i.  e.  knowing  along  with 
the  mind,  i.e.  apprehending  the  impressions  of  the 
mind  (Svabuddhi-Sawvedanam).  But  though  Altta 
is  the  work  of  the  Manas,  not  directly  of  the  Buddhi, 
this  A'itta,  when  seen  by  the  seer  (Purusha)  on  one 
side  and  tinged  with  what  is  seen  on  the  other,  may 
be  spoken  of  as  the  thought  of  the  Purusha,  though 


IS    YOGA    NIHILISM  ?  47! 

it  is  so  by  a  temporary  misconception  only.  This 
./Litta  again  is  coloured  by  many  former  impressions 
(Vasana).  It  may  be  called  the  highest  form  of 
PrakHti,  and  as  such  it  serves  no  purpose  of  its 
own,  but  works  really  for  another,  the  Purusha, 
whom  it  binds  and  fascinates  for  a  time  with  the 
sole  purpose,  we  are  told,  of  bringing  him  back  to 
a  final  recognition  of  his  true  Self  (IV,  24). 

Kaivalya. 

If  that  is  once  achieved,  the  Purusha  knows  that 
he  himself  is  not  experiencer,  neither  knower  nor 
actor  ;  and  the  Manas  or  active  mind,  when  beginning 
to  feel  the  approach  of  Kaivalya,  turns  more  and 
more  inward  and  away  from  the  world,  so  as  not  to 
interfere  with  the  obtainment  of  the  highest  bliss  of 
the  Purusha.  Yet  there  is  always  danger  of  a  relapse 
in  unguarded  moments  or  in  the  intervals  of  medita- 
tion. Old  impressions  may  reassert  themselves,  and 
the  mind  may  lose  its  steadiness,  unless  the  old 
Yoga-remedies  are  used  again  and  again  to  remove 
all  impediments.  Then  at  last,  perfect  discrimina- 
tion is  rewarded  by  what  is  called  by  a  strange 
term,  Dharmamegha,  the  cloud  of  virtue,  knowledge 
and  virtue  being  inseparable  like  cause  and  effect. 
All  works  and  all  sufferings  have  now  ceased,  even 
what  is  to  be  known  becomes  smaller  and  smaller, 
the  very  Gunas,  i.e.  Prakriti,  having  done  their 
work,  cease  troubling ;  Purusha  becomes  himself,  is 
independent,  undisturbed,  free,  and  blessed. 

Is  Yoga  Nihilism? 

This  is  the  end  of  the  Yoga-philosophy,  and  no 
wonder   that    it    should   have    been    mistaken    for 


472  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

complete  nihilism  by  Cousin  and  others.  But  first 
of  all,  the  play  of  Prak?^'ti,  though  it  has  ceased  for 
our  Purusha,  who  has  gained  true  knowledge,  is 
supposed  to  be  going  on  for  ever  for  the  benefit  of 
other  innumerable  Purushas  ;  and  as  long  as  there 
are  any  spectators,  the  spectacle  of  Prakrit!  will 
never  cease.  Secondly,  the  Purusha,  though  freed 
from  illusion,  is  not  thereby  annihilated.  He  is 
himself,  apart  from  nature,  and  it  is  possible,  though 
it  is  not  distinctly  stated,  that  the  Purusha  in  his 
aloneness  may  continue  his  life,  like  the  6rivan- 
nmkta  of  the  Vedanta,  maintaining  his  freedom 
among  a  crowd  of  slaves,  without  any  fear  or  hope 
of  another  life,  unchanged  himself  in  this  ever- 
changing  Samsara.  However,  we  need  not  attempt 
to  supply  what  Pata?~^ali  himself  has  passed  over  in 
silence.  The  final  goal  whether  of  the  Yoga,  or  of  the 
Samkhya,  nay  even  of  the  Vedanta  and  of  Buddhism, 
always  defies  description.  Nirvana  in  its  highest 
sense  is  a  name  and  a  thought,  but  nothing  can  be 
predicated  of  it.  It  is  '  what  no  eye  has  seen  and 
what  has  not  entered  into  the  mind  of  man.'  We 
know  that  it  is  ;  but  no  one  can  say  what  it  is,  and 
those  who  attempt  to  do  so  are  apt  to  reduce  it  to 
a  mere  phantasmagoria  or  to  a  nothing. 

Though  I  hope  that  the  foregoing  sketch  may 
give  a  correct  idea  of  the  general  tendency  of  the 
Yoga-philosophy,  I  know  but  too  well  that  there  are 
several  points  which  require  further  elucidation,  and 
on  which  even  native  expositors  hold  different 
opinions.  What  wre  must  guard  against  in  all  these 
studies  is  rejecting  as  absurd  whatever  we  cannot 
understand  at  once,  or  what  to  us  seems  fanciful  or 
irrational.  I  know  from  my  own  experience  how 


IS    YOGA    NIHILISM?  473 

often  what  seemed  to  me  for  a  long  time  unmeaning, 
nay  absurd,  disclosed  after  a  time  a  far  deeper 
meaning  than  I  should  ever  have  expected. 

The  great  multitude  of  technical  terms,  though 
it  may  be  bewildering  to  us,  could  not  be  entirely 
suppressed,  because  it  helps  to  show  through  how 
long  and  continuous  a  development  these  Indian 
systems  of  thought  must  have  passed,  before  any 
attempt  was  made,  as  it  was  by  Patafw/ali  and 
others,  to  reduce  them  to  systematic  order.  There 
remains  with  me  a  strong  conviction  that  Indian 
philosophers  are  honest  in  their  reasonings,  and 
never  use  empty  words.  But  there  remains  much 
to  be  done,  and  I  can  only  hope  that  if  others 
follow  in  my  footsteps,  they  will  in  time  make  these 
old  bones  to  live  again.  These  ancient  sages  should 
become  fellow-workers  and  fellow-explorers  with  our- 
selves in  unknown  continents  of  thought,  and  we 
ought  not  to  be  afraid  to  follow  in  their  track. 
They  always  have  the  courage  of  their  convictions, 
they  shrink  from  no  consequences  if  they  follow 
inevitably  from  their  own  premisses.  This  is  the 
reason  why  I  doubt  whether  the  admission  of  an 
Isvara  or  lord  by  Pataf^ali,  in  contradistinction  to 
Kapila  who  denies  that  there  are  any  arguments  in 
support  of  such  a  being,  should  be  put  down  as 
a  mere  economy  or  as  an  accommodation  to  popular 
opinion.  Indian  philosophers  are  truthful,  and 
Patark/ali  (II,  36)  says  in  so  many  words  that  truth 
is  letter  than  sacrifice  l.  They  may  err,  as  Plato 
has  erred  and  even  Kant,  but  they  are  not  decepti 
deceptores,  they  do  not  deceive  or  persuade  them- 
selves, nor  do  they  try  to  deceive  others. 

1  Satyapratish^ayam  kriyaphalasrayatvat. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

NYAYA    AND    VALSESHIKA. 

Eelation  between  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika. 

WHILE  in  the  systems  hitherto  examined,  par- 
ticularly in  the  Vedanta,  Samkhya,  and  Yoga,  there 
runs  a  strong  religious  and  even  poetical  vein,  we 
now  come  to  two  systems,  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika, 
which  are  very  dry  and  unimaginative,  and  much 
more  like  what  we  mean  by  scholastic  systems  of 
philosophy,  businesslike  expositions  of  what  can  be 
known,  either  of  the  world  which  surrounds  us  or  of 
the  world  within,  that  is,  of  our  faculties  or  powers  of 
perceiving,  conceiving,  or  reasoning  on  one  side,  and 
the  objects  which  they  present  to  us,  on  the  other. 

It  should  be  remembered  that,  like  the  Samkhya 
and  Yoga,  and  to  a  certain  extent  like  the  Purva  and 
Uttara-Mimawisa,  the  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  also  have 
by  the  Hindus  themselves  been  treated  as  forming 
but  one  discipline.  We  possess  indeed  a  separate  body 
of  Nyaya-Sutras  and  another  of  Vai.veshika-Sutras, 
and  these  with  their  reputed  authors,  Gotama  and 
Kanada,  have  long  been  accepted  as  the  original 
sources  whence  these  two  streams  of  the  ancient 
philosophy  of  India  proceeded.  But  we  know  now 
that  the  literary  style  which  sprang  up  naturally  in 
what  I  called  the  Sutra-period,  the  period  to  which 
the  first  attempts  at  a  written  in  place  of  a  purely 


RELATION    BETWEEN    NYAYA    AND    VAISESHIKA.      475 

mnemonic  literature  may  have  to  be  ascribed,  was 
by  no  means  restricted  to  that  ancient  period,  but 
continued  to  be  so  well  imitated  in  later  times  that 
we  find  it  used  with  great  success  not  only  in  the 
Samkhya-Sutras,  which  are  later  than  Madhava 
(1350  A.D.),  but  in  more  modern  compositions  also. 
It  should  always  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  Sutras 
ascribed  to  Gotama  and  Ka^ada  presuppose  a  long 
previous  development  of  philosophical  thought,  and 
instead  of  regarding  the  two  as  two  independent 
streams,  it  seems  far  more  likely  that  there  existed  at 
first  an  as  yet  undifferentiated  body  of  half  philosophi- 
cal half  popular  thought,  bearing  on  things  that  can 
be  known,  the  Padarthas,  i.e.  omne  scibile,  and  on  the 
means  of  acquiring  such  knowledge,  from  which  at  a 
later  time,  according  to  the  preponderance  of  either 
the  one  or  the  other  subject,  the  two  systems  of  Vaise- 
shika  and  Nyaya  branched  off.  These  two  systems 
shared  of  course  many  things  in  common,  and  hence 
we  can  well  understand  that  at  a  later  time  they 
should  have  been  drawn  together  again  and  treated 
as  one,  as  we  see  in  >Sivaditya's  Saptapadarthi 
(about  1400  A.D.),  in  the  Bhasha-PariM'Aeda,  with  its 
commentary  the  Muktavali,  in  the  Tarkasamgraha, 
the  Tarkakaumudi,  the  TarkamHta,  &c.  For  practi- 
cal purposes  it  is  certainly  preferable  that  we  should 
follow  their  example  and  thus  avoid  the  necessity 
of  discussing  the  same  subjects  twice  over.  There 
may  have  been  an  old  Tarka,  very  like  our  Tar- 
kasamgraha, the  one  before  the  bifurcation  of  the 
old  system  of  Anvikshikl,  the  other  after  the  con- 
fluence of  the  two.  But  these  are  as  yet  conjectures 
only,  and  may  have  to  remain  mere  conjectures 
always,  so  that,  in  the  present  state  of  our  know- 


476  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

ledge,  and  depending,  as  we  have  to  do,  chiefly  on 
the  existing  Sutras  as  the  authorities  recognised 
in  India  itself,  we  must  not  attempt  a  historical 
treatment,  but  treat  each  system  by  itself  in  spite 
of  unavoidable  repetitions. 

A  very  zealous  native  scholar,  Mahadeo  Rajaram 
Bodas,  in  the  Introduction  to  his  edition  of  the 
Tarkasa??igraha,  has  indeed  promised  to  give  us 
some  kind  of  history  of  the  Nyaya-philosophy  in 
India.  But  unfortunately  that  period  in  the  his- 
torical development  of  the  Nyaya  which  is  of  greatest 
interest  to  ourselves,  namely  that  which  preceded 
the  composition  of  the  Nyaya-Sutras,  had  by  him 
also  to  be  left  a  blank,  for  the  simple  reason  that 
nothing  is  known  of  Nyaya  before  Gotama.  The 
later  periods,  however,  have  been  extremely  well 
treated  by  Mr.  Bodas,  and  I  may  refer  my  readers 
to  him  for  the  best  information  on  the  subject. 
Mr.  Bodas  places  the  Sutras  of  Gotama  and  Kanada 
in  the  fifth  or  fourth  cent.  B.C.  ;  and  he  expresses  a 
belief  that  the  Vaiseshika,  nay  even  the  Samkhya, 
as  systems  of  thought,  were  anterior  to  Buddha, 
without  however  adducing  any  new  or  certain 

proofs. 

Dignaga. 

Dates  are  the  weak  points  in  the  literary  history 
of  India,  and,  in  the  present  state  of  our  studies, 
any  date,  however  late,  should  be  welcome.  In 
former  years  to  assign  the  Kapila-Sutras  to  the 
fourteenth  or  even  fifteenth  century  A.  D.,  would  have 
seemed  downright  heresy.  Was  not  Kalidasa  himself 
assigned  to  a  period  long  before  the  beginning  of  our 
era  ?  It  seems  now  generally  accepted  that  Kalidasa 
really  belonged  to  the  sixth  century  A.  D.,  and  this 


DIGNAGA.  477 

date  of  Kalidasa  may  help  us  to  a  date  for  the 
Sutras  of  Gotama,  valuable  to  us,  though  it  may 
be  despised  by  those  who  imagine  that  the  value 
of  Sanskrit  literature  depends  chiefly  on  its  sup- 
posed remote  antiquity.  I  have  pointed  out l  that, 
according  to  native  interpreters,  Kalidasa  alluded  to 
the  logician  Dignaga  in  a  verse  of  his  Meghaduta 2. 
We  may  suppose  therefore  that  Dignaga  was  con- 
sidered a  contemporary  of  Kalidasa.  Now  Dignaga 
is  said  by  Ya&aspati  Misra,  in  his  Nyaya-varttika- 
tatparya-£ika,  to  have  interpreted  the  Nyaya  aphor- 
isms of  Gotama  in  a  heterodox  or  Buddhist  sense, 
while  Uddyotakara  wrote  his  commentary  to  refute 
his  interpretation  and  to  restore  that  of  Pakshila- 
svamin.  If  Va&aspati  Misra  is  right,  we  should  be 
allowed  to  place  Dignaga  in  the  sixth  century,  and 
assign  the  same  or  rather  an  earlier  date  to  the 
Sutras  of  Gotama,  as  explained  by  him  and  other 
Nyaya  philosophers.  So  late  a  date  may  not  seem 
to  be  worth  much,  still  I  think  it  is  worth  having. 
Several  other  dates  may  be  fixed  by  means  of  that 
of  Dignaga  as  I  tried  to  show  in  the  passage  quoted 
above  (India,  pp.  307  seq.). 

A  more  comprehensive  study  of  Buddhist  litera- 
ture may  possibly  shed  some  more  light  on  the 
chronology  of  the  later  literature  of  the  Brahmans, 
if  I  am  right  in  supposing  that  in  the  beginning  the 
followers  of  Buddha  broke  by  no  means  so  entirely, 
as  has  generally  been  supposed,  with  the  literary 
traditions  of  the  Brahmans.  It  is  quite  intelligible 


1  India,  p.  307. 

2  See  also  Prof.  Satis  Chandra  Vidyablmshana  in  Journal 
of  Buddhist  Text  Society,  IV,  parts  iii,  and  iv,  p.  16. 


INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

why  among  the  various  systems  of  Hindu  philosophy 
the  Buddhists  should  have  paid  little  attention  to 
the  two  Mimawsas,  concerned  as  they  both  were 
with  the  Veda,  an  authority  which  the  Buddhists 
had  rejected.  But  there  was  no  reason  why  the 
Buddhists  should  forswear  the  study  of  either  the 
Nyaya  or  Vaiseshika  systems,  or  even  the  Sawkhya 
system,  though  making  their  reserves  on  certain 
points,  such  as  the  existence  of  an  Lsvara,  which 
was  admitted  by  the  Nyayas,  but  denied  by  Buddha. 
We  know  that  at  the  court  of  Harsha,  Brahmans, 
Bauddhas,  and  6rainas  were  equally  welcome  (India, 
pp.  307  seq.).  We  know  from  Chinese  travellers  such 
as  Hiouen-thsang  that  Vasubandha,  for  instance, 
before  he  became  a  Buddhist,  had  read  with  his 
master,  Vinayabhadra  or  Samghabhadra1,  not  only 
the  books  of  the  eighteen  schools  which  were  Bud- 
dhist, but  also  the  six  Tirthya  philosophies,  clearly 
meant  for  the  six  Brahmanic  systems  of  philosophy. 
This  Yasubaridha,  as  a  very  old  man,  was  actuallv 
the  teacher  of  Hiouen-thsang,  who  travelled  in  India 
from  629  to  648  A.  D.  Therefore  in  Vasubandha's 
time  all  the  six  systems  of  Indian  philosophy  must 
have  been  in  existence,  in  the  form  of  Sutras  or 
Karikas.  For  we  possess,  in  one  case  at  least, 
a  commentary  by  Pakshila-svamin  or  Vatsyayana 
on  the  Nyaya-Sfitras,  the  same  as  those  which  we 
possess,  and  we  know  that  the  same  Sutras  were  ex- 
plained afterwards  by  Dignaga,  the  Buddhist.  This 
Buddhist  commentary  was  attacked  by  Uddyota- 
kara,  a  Brahman,  of  the  sixth  century,  while  in  the 
beginning  of  the  seventh  century  Dharmakirtti, 

1  See  also  Journal  of  Buddhist  Text  Society,  1896,  p.  16. 


DIGNAGA.  479 

a  Buddhist,  is  said  to  have  defended  Dignaga l  and 
to  have  criticised  Uddyotakara's  Nyayavarttika. 
In  the  ninth  century  Dharmottara,  a  Buddhist, 
defended  Dharmakirtti's  and  indirectly  Dignaga's 
interpretation  of  the  Nyaya-Sutras,  and  it  was  not 
till  the  tenth  century  that  Va&aspati  Misra  finally 
re-established  the  Brahmanic  view  of  the  Nyaya 
in  his  Nyaya-varttika-tatparya-£ika.  This  would 
coincide  with  the  period  of  the  Brahmanic  reaction 
and  the  general  collapse  of  Buddhism  in  India,  and 
thus  place  before  us  an  intelligible  progress  in  the 
study  of  the  Nyaya  both  by  Brahmans  and  Buddhists 
from  the  sixth  to  the  tenth  century,  while  the  re- 
vival of  the  Nyaya  dates  from  Gamgesa  Upadhyaya 
who  lived  in  the  fourteenth  century  at  Mithila. 

Thanks  to  the  labours  of  Sarat  Chandra  Das 
and  Satis  Chandra  Vidyabhusharta,  we  have  lately 
gained  access  to  some  of  the  Sutras  of  the  Buddhist 
schools  of  philosophy,  which  are  full  of  interest. 
Of  the  four  great  schools  of  the  Buddhists,  the 
Madhyamika,  Yogalura,  Sautrantika,  and  Vaibha- 
shika,  the  first  or  Madhyamika  now  lies  before  us 
in  the  Madhyamika  'Vritti  by  A^andra-Kirtti,  and 
there  is  every  hope  that  other  philosophical  treatises 
also,  for  instance,  the  Nyaya-samuM'aya,  may  be 
made  accessible  to  us  by  the  labours  of  these  inde- 
fatigable scholars. 

The  Sutras  or  rather  Karikas  of  the  Madhyamika 
school  must,  of  course,  be  distinguished  from  the 
system  of  thought  which  they  are  meant  to  explain. 

3  Though  none  of  Dignaga's  writings  have  as  yet  been  dis- 
covered, Sri  Sarat  Chandra  states  that  there  is  in  the  library  of 
the  Grand  Lama  a  Tibetan  translation  of  his  Nyaya-samuft&aya 
(Journal  of  Buddhist  Text  Society,  part  iii,  1896,  p.  17). 


480  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

The  characteristic  feature  of  that  system  is  the 
£unya-vada,  or  nihilism,  pure  and  simple.  As  such 
it  is  referred  to  and  refuted  in  Gotama's  Nyaya- 
Sutras  IV,  37  to  40,  in  Kapila's  Samkhya-Sutras  I, 
43,  44,  in  Badarayana's  Yedanta-Sutras  II,  2,  28, 
where  $a??ikara  distinctly  refers  the  doctrine  that 
we  know  no  objects,  but  only  our  perceptions  of  them, 
to  Sugata  or  Buddha.  The  author  of  the  Parl&adasi 
quotes  the  Madhyamikas  by  name  as  the  teachers  of 
universal  nihilism  (Sarvam  iSunyam). 

If  Nagar^una  was  really  the  author  of  the 
Madhyamika-Sutras,  as  we  now  possess  them,  they 
would  carry  us  back  to  about  the  first  century  A.  D.  , 
and  we  should  have  in  his  Karikcas,  as  explained  by 
A'andra-Kirtti,  the  oldest  document  of  systematic 
philosophy  in  India,  which  will  require  very  careful 
examination.  Though  it  is  different,  no  doubt,  from 
all  the  six  systems,  it  nevertheless  shares  in  common 
with  them  many  of  the  ideas  and  even  technical 
terms.  If  it  teaches  the  /Sunyatva  or  emptiness  of 
the  world,  this  after  all  is  not  very  different  from 
the  Vedantic  Avidya,  and  the  Sa?>ikhya  Aviveka, 
and  if  it  teaches  the  Pratityatva  of  everything,  that 
need  be  no  more  than  the  dependence  of  everything 
on  something  else1.  The  distinction  made  by  the 
Madhyamikas  between  what  is  Paramarthika,  real 
in  the  highest  sense,  and  Samvntika,  veiled,  is 
much  the  same  as  the  distinction  of  the  later 
Vedanta  between  what  is  really  real  (Paramartha- 


1  Pratitya  in  Pratitya-samutpada  and  similar  words  may  best 
he  rendered  by  dependent  or  conditioned.  A  son,  for  instance, 
is  a  son,  Pitaram  Pratitya,  dependent  on  a  father,  and  a  father 
is  impossible  without  a  son.  In  the  same  way  everything  is 
dependent  on  something  else. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY.  481 

ta/i),  and  what  is  Vyavaharika,  phenomenal  or  the 
result  of  Maya,  sometimes  called  Samvn'ti,  the  veil 
that  covers  the  Nirgwia  Brahman  or  the  Tad,  which 
again  is  not  very  different  from  what  the  Buddhists 
meant  originally  by  /Sunya,  empty,  for  they  hold  that 
even  the  $unya  is  not  altogether  nothing.  Many  of 
the  technical  terms  used  by  the  Madhyamikas  are  the 
same  as  those  with  which  we  are  acquainted  in 
the  other  systems.  Du/ikha,  pain,  for  instance,  is 
divided  into  Adhyatmika,  intrinsic,  Adhibhautika, 
extrinsic,  and  Adhidaivika,  divine  or  supernatural. 
We  meet  with  the  five  perceptions  of  colour,  taste, 
smell,  touch,  and  sound,  and  with  their  five  causes, 
light,  water,  earth,  air,  and  ether,  and  we  also  have 
the  well-known  idea  that  Manas,  mind,  forms  the 
sixth  sense.  What  is  peculiar  to  the  Buddhists  is 
that  to  them  neither  the  objects  of  sense  nor  the  sen- 
sations point  to  an  underlying  substance  or  reality. 

We  owe  a  great  debt  of  gratitude  to  both  Sarat 
Chandra  Das  and  Sri  Satis  Chandra  Vidyabhushana 
for  their  labours  in  Tibet,  and  we  look  forward  to 
many  valuable  contributions  from  their  pen,  more 
particularly  for  retranslations  from  Tibetan. 

Whether  Buddhist  philosophy  shares  more  in 
common  with  the  Samkhya  than  with  the  Nyaya  and 
Vaiseshika  seems  to  me  as  doubtful  as  ever.  The 
fundamental  position  of  the  Samkhya,  as  Satkarya- 
vada,  is  the  very  opposite  of  the  Buddhist  view  of 
the  world. 

Bibliography. 

It  was  in  1852  that  published  my  first  contri- 
butions to  a  study  of  Indian  philosophy  in  the 
Zeitschrift  der  Deutschen  Morgenlandisclien  Ge- 
sellschaft.  These  papers  did  not  extend,  however, 

i  i 


482  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

beyond  the  Vaiseshika  and  Nyaya-philosophy  as 
treated  in  the  Tarkasa?ttgraha,  and  more  urgent 
occupations  connected  with  the  edition  of  the  Rig- 
veda  prevented  me  at  the  time  from  finishing  what 
I  had  prepared  for  publication  on  the  other  systems 
of  Indian  philosophy.  Though,  of  course,  much  new 
and  important  material  has  come  to  light  in  the 
meantime,  particularly  through  the  publications  of 
the  Vaiseshika-Sutras  in  the  Bibliotlieca  Indica, 
through  the  complete  translation  of  them  by  A.  E. 
Gough,  1873,  and  through  the  comprehensive  re- 
searches of  European  scholars,  such  as  Professors 
Deussen  and  Garbe,  I  found  that  there  was  not 
much  to  alter  in  my  old  account  of  Gotama's  and 
Kanada's  philosophies,  as  given  in  the  German 
Oriental  Journal,  and  in  my  paper  on  Indian  Logic 
contributed  to  the  late  Archbishop  Thomson's  Laws 
of  Thought.  Indian  philosophy  has  this  great  ad- 
vantage that  each  tenet  is  laid  down  in  the  Sutras 
with  the  utmost  precision,  so  that  there  can  be 
little  doubt  as  to  what  Ka?iada  or  Gotama  thought 
about  the  nature  of  the  soul,  the  reality  of  human 
knowledge,  the  relation  between  cause  and  effect, 
the  meaning  of  creation,  and  the  relation  between 
God  or  the  Supreme  Being  and  man.  Thus  it  may 
be  understood  why  even  papers  published  so  long  ago 
as  1824,  such  as  J.  Colebrooke's  papers  on  the  Nyaya 
and  Vai.veshika  and  the  other  systems  of  Indian 
philosophy,  may  still  be  recommended  to  all  who 
want  trustworthy  information  on  Indian  philosophy. 
These  essays  have  sometimes  been  called  antiquated, 
but  there  is  a  great  difference  between  what  is  old 
and  what  is  antiquated.  The  difficulty  in  giving  an 
account  of  these  systems  for  the  benefit  of  European 


BIBLIOGRAPHY.  483 

readers  consists  far  more  in  deciding  what  may  be 
safely  omitted,  so  as  to  bring  out  the  salient  points  of 
each  system,  than  in  recapitulating  all  their  tenets. 

Books  in  which  the  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika-systems 
may  be  studied  by  those  who  are  unacquainted  with 
Sanskrit  are,  besides  the  papers  of  Colebrooke  : — 

Ballantyne,  The  Aphorisms  of  the  Nyaya-Philo- 
sophy  by  Gautama,  Sanskrit  and  English,  Allahabad, 
1850.  (Gautama  is  the  same  as  Gotama,  only  that 
by  a  tacit  agreement  Gotama  has  generally  been 
used  as  the  name  of  the  philosopher,  Gautama  as 
that  of  Buddha,  both  belonging,  it  would  seem, 
to  the  family  of  the  Gautamas  or  Gotamas,  the 
MSS.  varying  with  regard  to  the  vowel.) 

A.  E.  Gough,  The  Vaiseshika  Aphorisms  of  Kanada, 
translated,  Benares,  1873. 

Manilal  Nabubhai  Dvivedi,  The  Tarka-Kaumudi, 
being  an  introduction  to  the  principles  of  the 
Yaiseshika  arid  Nyaya-philosophies  by  Laugakshi 
Bhaskara,  Bombay,  1886.  This  is  the  same  author 
to  whom  we  owe  a  valuable  edition  of  the  Yogasara- 
sawgraha. 

Windisch,  Uber  das  Nyaya-bhashya,  Leipzig,  s.  a. 

Kesava  $astri,  The  Nyaya-darsana  with  the  com- 
mentary of  Vatsyayana,  in  the  Pundit,  1877,  pp.  60, 
1 09, 311,363  (incomplete) ;  see  also  Bibliotheca  Indica. 

Mahadeo  Kajaram  Bodas,  The  Tarkasamgraha  of 
Annambha^a,  with  the  author's  Dipika  and 
Govardhana's  Nyaya-bodhini,  prepared  by  the  late 
Kao  Bahadur  Yasavanta  Vasadeo  Athalya,  and  pub- 
lished with  critical  and  explanatory  notes,  Bombay, 
1897.  This  book  reached  me  after  these  chapters 
on  the  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  were  written,  but 
not  too  late  to  enable  me  to  profit  by  several  of 

I  i  2 


484  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

his  explanations  and   criticisms,  before  they  were 

printed. 

Ny  ay  a-P  hilosophy . 

Though  Nyaya  has  always  been  translated  by 
logic,  we  must  not  imagine  that  the  Nyaya-Sutras 
are  anything  like  our  treatises  on  formal  logic.  There 
is,  no  doubt,  a  greater  amount  of  space  allowed  to 
logical  questions  in  these  than  in  any  of  the  other 
systems  of  Indian  philosophy  ;  but  originally  the 
name  of  Nyaya  would  have  been  quite  as  applicable 
to  the  Purva-Mimamsa,  which  is  actually  called 
Nyaya  in  such  works,  for  instance,  as  Sayana's 
Nyaya-mala-vistara,  published  by  Goldstlicker.  Nor 
is  logic  the  sole  or  chief  end  of  Gotama's  philosophy. 
Its  chief  end,  like  that  of  the  other  Darsanas,  is 
salvation,  the  summum  bonum  which  is  promised  to 
all.  This  summum  bonum  is  called  by  Gotama 
Ni/zsreyasa,  literally  that  which  has  nothing  better, 
the  non  plus  ultra  of  blessedness.  This  blessedness, 
according  to  the  ancient  commentator  Vatsyayana, 
is  described  as  consisting  in  renunciation  with  re- 
gard to  all  the  pleasures  of  this  life,  and  in  the  non- 
acceptance  of,  or  indifference  to  any  rewards  in  the 
life  to  come  ;  as  being  in  fact  what  Brahman  is, 
without  fear,  without  desire,  without  decay,  and 
without  death.  Even  this  Brahmahood  must  not  be 
an  object  of  desire,  for  such  desire  would  at  once 
produce  a  kind  of  bondage,  and  prevent  that  perfect 
freedom  from  all  fear  or  hope,  which  is  to  follow  by 
itself,  but  should  never  be  yearned  for.  Thin  perfect 
state  of  freedom,  or  resignation,  can,  according  to 
Gotama,  be  realised  in  one  way  only,  namely,  by 
knowledge,  and  in  this  case,  by  a  knowledge  of  the 
sixteen  great  topics  of  the  Nyaya-philosophy. 


SUMMUM    BONUM.  485 

Summum  Bonum. 

In  this  respect  all  the  six  systems  of  philosophy 
are  alike,  they  always  promise  to  their  followers  or 
their  believers  the  attainment  of  the  highest  bliss 
that  can  be  obtained  by  man.  The  approaches  lead- 
ing to  that  bliss  vary,  and  the  character  also  of  the 
promised  bliss  is  not  always  the  same ;  yet  in  each 
of  the  six  systems  philosophy  is  recommended  not, 
as  with  us,  for  the  sake  of  knowledge,  but  for  the 
highest  purpose  that  man  can  strive  after  in  this 
life,  that  is,  his  own  salvation. 

We  saw  that  the  Vedanta  recognised  true  salva- 
tion or  Moksha  in  the  knowledge  of  Brahman,  which 
knowledge  is  tantamount  to  identity  with  Brahman. 
This  Brahman  or  God  is,  as  the  Upanishads  already 
declare,  invisible,  and  far  beyond  the  reach  of  the 
ordinary  faculties  of  our  mind.  But  he  can  be 
learnt  from  revelation  as  contained  in  the  Veda,  and 
as  $vetaketu  was  taught  '  Tat  tvam  asi/  '  Thou  art 
it,'  every  Vedantist  is  to  learn  in  the  end  the  same 
lesson,  and  to  realise  his  identity  with  Brahman,  as 
the  fulfilment  of  all  desires,  and  the  surcease  of  all 
suffering  (Du^khanta). 

The  end  of  all  suffering  is  likewise  the  object  of 
the  Samkhya-philosophy,  though  it  is  to  be  reached 
by  a  different  road.  Kapila,  being  a  dualist,  admits 
an  objective  substratum  by  the  side  of  a  subjective 
spirit  or  rather  spirits,  and  he  sees  the  cause  of  all 
suffering  in  the  spirits'  identifying  themselves  with 
what  is  purely  objective  or  material.  He  therefore 
recognises  the  true  means  of  destroying  all  bondage 
and  regaining  perfect  freedom  of  the  spirit  in  our 
distinguishing  clearly  between  spirit  and  matter, 


486  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

between  subject  and  object,  between  Purusha  and 
Prak?-iti.  Kaivalya,  or  aloneness,  is  the  right  name 
for  that  highest  state  of  bliss  which  is  promised  to 
us  by  the  Samkhya-philosophy. 

The  Yoga-philosophy  holds  much  the  same  view 
of  the  soul  recovering  its  freedom,  but  it  insists 
strongly  on  certain  spiritual  exercises  by  which  the 
soul  may  best  obtain  and  maintain  peace  and  quiet- 
ness, and  thus  free  itself  effectually  from  the  illusions 
and  sufferings  of  life.  It  also  lays  great  stress  on 
devotion  to  a  Spirit,  supreme  among  all  the  other 
spirits,  whose  very  existence,  according  to  Kapila, 
cannot  be  established  by  any  of  the  recognised 
means  of  real  knowledge,  the  Pramawas. 

Of  the  two  Mima??isas  we  have  seen  already  that 
the  Brahma-Mimawsa  or  the  Vedanta  recognises  sal- 
vation as  due  to  knowledge  of  the  Brahman,  which 
knowledge  produces  at  once  the  recognition  of  one- 
self as  in  reality  Brahman  (Brahmavid  Brahma 
eva  bhavati,  '  He  who  knows  Brahman  is  Brahman 
indeed  ').  It  is  curious  to  observe  that,  while  the 
Sa?7ikhya  insists  on  a  distinction  between  Purushas, 
the  subjects,  and  Prakriti,  all  that  is  objective,  as 
the  only  means  of  final  beatitude,  the  Vedanta  on 
the  contrary  postulates  the  surrendering  of  all 
distinction  between  the  Self  and  the  world,  and 
between  the  Self  and  Brahman  as  the  right  means 
of  Moksha.  The  roads  are  different,  but  the  point 
reached  at  last  is  much  the  same. 

The  other  Mima?usa,  that  of  (7aimini,  diverges 
widely  from  that  of  Badarayami.  It  lays  its  chief 
stress  on  works  (Karman)  and  their  right  perform- 
ance, and  holds  that  salvation  may  be  obtained 
through  the  performance  of  such  works,  if  only 


SUMMUM    BONUM.  487 

they  are  performed  without  any  desire  of  rewards, 
whether  on  earth  or  in  heaven. 

Lastly,  the  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  systems, 
though  they  also  aim  at  salvation,  are  satisfied  with 
pointing  out  the  means  of  it  as  consisting  in  correct 
knowledge,  such  as  can  only  be  obtained  from  a 
clear  apprehension  of  the  sixteen  topics  treated  by 
Gotama,  or  the  six  or  seven  categories  put  forward 
by  Kar^ada.  These  two  philosophies,  agreeing  as 
they  do  among  themselves,  seem  to  me  to  differ 
very  characteristically  from  all  the  others  in  so  far 
as  they  admit  of  nothing  invisible  or  transcendent 
(Avyakta),  whether  corresponding  to  Brahman  or 
to  Prak?^'ti.  They  are  satisfied  with  teaching  that 
the  soul  is  different  from  the  body,  and  they  think 
that,  if  this  belief  in  the  body  as  our  own  is  once 
surrendered,  our  sufferings,  which  always  reach  us 
through  the  body,  will  cease  by  themselves. 

But  while  we  can  understand  that  each  of  the 
six  systems  of  Indian  philosophy  may  succeed  in 
removing  pain,  it  is  very  difficult  to  see  in  what 
that  actual  happiness  was  supposed  to  consist  which 
remained  after  that  removal. 

The  Vedanta  speaks  of  Ananda,  or  bliss,  that 
resides  in  the  highest  Brahman  ;  but  the  happiness 
to  be  enjoyed  by  the  souls  near  the  throne  of 
Brahman,  and  in  a  kind  of  paradise,  is  not  considered 
as  final,  but  is  assigned  to  a  lower  class  only.  That 
paradise  has  no  attraction,  and  would  give  no  real 
satisfaction  to  those  who  have  reached  the  know- 
ledge of  the  Highest  Brahman.  Their  blissful  know- 
ledge is  described  as  oneness  with  Brahman,  but 
no  details  are  added.  The  bliss  held  out  by  the 
Samkhyas  also  is  very  vague  and  indefinite.  It 


488  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

can  arise  only  from  the  Purusha  himself,  if  left 
entirely  to  himself,  far  from  all  the  illusions  and 
disturbances  arising  from  objective  nature,  or  the 
works  of  Pralm'ti. 

Lastly,  the  Apavarga  (bliss)  of  the  Nyaya  and 
Vaiseshika  systems  seems  entirely  negative,  and 
produced  simply  by  the  removal  of  false  knowledge. 
Even  the  different  names  given  to  the  supreme 
bliss  promised  by  each  system  of  philosophy  tell 
us  very  little.  Mukti  and  Moksha  mean  deliver- 
ance, Kaivalya,  isolation  or  detachment,  NiAsreyasa, 
7io?i  plus  ultra,  Amrita,  immortality,  Apavarga, 
delivery.  Nor  does  the  well-known  Buddhist  term 
Nirvana  help  us  much.  We  know  indeed  from 
Pa?iini  (VIII,  2,  50)  that  the  word  was  pre-Bud- 
dhistic  and  existed  in  his  time.  He  tells  us  that, 
if  used  in  the  sense  of '  blown  out,'  the  right  form 
would  be  Nirvata/^,  such  as  Nirvat'o  vata/i,  'the  wind 
has  ceased  to  blow,'  but  Nirvano  *ghih,  '  the  fire  is 
gone  out.'  We  cannot  prove,  however,  that  Nir- 
vana was  used  as  the  technical  term  for  the  summum 
bonum  in  Pa?dni's  time,  and  it  does  not  seem  to 
occur  in  the  classical  Upanishads.  Its  occurring  as 
the  title  of  one  of  the  modern  Upanishads  makes  it 
all  the  more  likely  that  it  was  borrowed  there  from 
Buddhistic  sources.  There  is  one  passage  only,  in 
the  shorter  text  of  the  Maitreya  l  Upanishad  where 
Nirvanam  anusasanam  occurs,  possibly  meant  for 
Nirvananu.sasanam,  the  teaching  of  Nirvana.  What 
should  be  clearly  understood  is  that  in  the  early 
Buddhistic  writings  also,  Nirvfwa  does  not  yet 
mean  a  complete  blowing  out  of  the  individual  soul, 

1  Sacred  Books  of  the  East,  XV,  p.  61. 


THE    SIXTEEN    TOPICS    OR    PADARTHAS.  489 

but  rather  the  blowing  out  and  subsiding  of  all 
human  passions  and  the  peace  and  quietness  which 
result  from  it.  The  meaning  of  complete  annihila- 
tion was  a  later  and  purely  philosophical  meaning 
attached  to  Nirvana,  and  no  one  certainly  could 
form  an  idea  of  what  that  Nirvana  was  meant  to 
be  in  the  Buddhist  Nihilistic  or  >Sunyata-philosophy. 
I  doubt  even  whether  the  Upanishads  could  have 
given  us  a  description  of  what  they  conceived  their 
highest  Mukti  or  perfect  freedom  to  be.  In  fact 
they  confess  themselves  (Taitt.  Up.  II,  4,  i)  that 
'  all  speech  turns  away  from  the  bliss  of  Brahman, 
unable  to  reach  it  V  and  when  language  fails,  thought 
is  not  likely  to  fare  better. 

Means  of  Salvation. 

Turning  now  to  the  means  by  which  the  Nyaya- 
philosophy  undertakes  to  secure  the  attainment  of 
the  summum  bonum  or  Apavarga,  we  find  them 
enumerated  in  the  following  list : — 

The  Sixteen  Topics  or  Padarthas. 

(i)  Pramana,  means  of  knowledge  ;  (2)  Prameya, 
objects  of  knowledge  ;  (3)  Samsaya,  doubt  ;  (4) 
Prayo^ana,  purpose  ;  (5)  DHsh^anta,  instance  ; 
(6)  Siddhanta,  established  truth  ;  (7)  Avayava, 
premisses  ;  (8)  Tarka,  reasoning ;  (9)  Nirnaya,  con- 
clusion;  (10)  Vada,  argumentation;  (n)  6ralpa, 
sophistry;  (12)  Vitanc/a,  wrangling,  cavilling;  (13) 
Hetvabhasa,  fallacies;  (14)  /f/^ala,  quibbles;  (15) 

1  See  a  very  learned  article  on  Nirvawa  by  Professor  Satis 
Chandra  Vidyabhushawa,  in  the  Journal  of  the  Buddhist  Text 
Society,  VI,  part  i,  p.  22. 


49°  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

^rati,  false  analogies;   (16)  Nigrahasthana,  unfitness 
for  arguing. 

This  may  seem  a  very  strange  list  of  the  topics 
to  be  treated  by  any  philosophy,  particularly  by  one 
that  claims  the  title  of  Nyaya  or  logic.  It  is  clear 
that  in  reality  the  chapters  on  Prama?ia  or  means  of 
knowledge,  and  Prameya,  objects  of  knowledge, 
comprehend  the  whole  of  philosophy. 

Means  of  Knowledge. 

The  four  Pramanas,  according  to  Gotama,  are 
Pratyaksha,  sensuous  perception,  Anumana,  infer- 
ence, Upamana,  comparison,  and  >Sabda,  word. 

Perception  comes  first,  because  inference  can  only 
begin  to  do  its  work  after  perception  has  prepared 
the  way,  and  has  supplied  the  material  to  which 
inference  can  be  applied.  Comparison  is  no  more 
than  a  subordinate  kind  of  inference,  while  the 
$abda  or  the  word,  particularly  that  of  the  Veda, 
depends  again,  as  we  should  say,  on  a  previous 
inference  by  which  the  authority  of  the  word,  more 
particularly  the  revealed  word,  has  first  been  estab- 
lished. Imperfect  as  this  analysis  of  our  instru- 
ments of  knowledge  may  seem,  it  seems  to  me 
highly  creditable  to  Indian  philosophers  that  they 
should  have  understood  the  necessity  of  such  an 
analysis  on  the  very  threshold  of  any  system  of 
philosophy.  How  many  misunderstandings  might 
have  been  avoided  if  all  philosophers  had  recognised 
the  necessity  of  such  an  introductory  chapter.  If 
we  must  depend  for  all  our  knowledge,  first  on  our 
senses,  then  on  our  combinatory  and  reasoning 
faculties,  the  question  whether  revelation  falls  under 
the  one  or  the  other,  or  whether  it  can  claim  an 


OBJECTS    OF    KNOWLEDGE.  49! 

independent  authority,  can  far  more  easily  be  settled 
than  if  such  questions  are  not  asked  in  limine,  but 
turn  up  casually  whenever  transcendental  problems 
come  to  be  treated. 

Objects  of  Knowledge. 

The  objects  of  knowledge,  as  given  by  the  Nyaya, 
comprehend  omne  scibile,  such  as  body,  soul,  organs 
of  sense,  qualities,  cognition,  mind,  will,  fault, 
death,  enjoyment,  pain,  and  final  freedom.  These 
objects  are  afterwards  discussed  singly,  but  have  of 
course  little  to  do  with  logic.  Doubt  and  purpose 
mark  the  first  steps  towards  philosophical  discussion, 
instances  and  established  truths  supply  materials, 
wrhile  premisses  and  reasoning  lead  on  to  the  con- 
clusion which  disputants  wish  to  reach.  From  Nos. 
10  to  1 6,  we  have  rules  for  dialectic  rather  than  for 
logic.  We  are  taught  how  to  meet  the  artifices  of 
our  antagonists  in  a  long  argumentation,  how  to 
avoid  or  to  resist  sophistry,  wrangling,  fallacies, 
quibbles,  false  analogies,  and  downright  misstate- 
ments,  in  fact,  how  to  defend  truth  against  unfair 
antagonists. 

If  from  our  point  of  view  we  deny  the  name  of 
logic  to  such  problems,  we  should  be  perfectly 
justified,  though  a  glance  at  the  history  of  Greek 
philosophy  would  show  us  that,  before  logic  became 
an  independent  branch  of  philosophy  it  was  likewise 
mixed  up  with  dialectic  and  with  questions  of  some 
more  special  interest,  the  treatment  of  which  led 
gradually  to  the  elaboration  of  general  rules  of 
thought,  applicable  to  all  reasoning,  whatever  its 
subject  may  be. 

It  is  quite  clear  that  these  sixteen  topics  should 


492  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

on  no  account  be  rendered,  as  they  mostly  have 
been,  by  the  sixteen  categories.  Categories  are  the 
praedicabilia,  or  whatever  can  be  predicated,  and 
however  much  the  meaning  of  this  term  may  have 
been  varied  by  European  philosophers,  it  could  never 
have  been  so  far  extended  as  to  include  wrangling, 
fallacies,  quibbles  and  all  the  rest.  We  shall  see 
that  the  six  or  seven  Padarthas  of  the  Vaiseshikas 
correspond  far  more  nearly  to  the  categories  of  the 
Aristotelian  and  afterwards  of  European  philosophy 
in  general. 

Padartha,  Object. 

Nothing  shows  so  well  the  philosophical  character 
of  the  Sanskrit  language  than  this  very  word  Pad- 
artha, which  has  been  translated  by  category.  It 
means  in  ordinary  Sanskrit  simply  a  thing,  but 
literally  it  meant  Artha,  the  meaning,  the  object, 
Pada,  of  a  word.  What  we  should  call  objects  of 
thought,  they  called  far  more  truly  objects  of  words, 
thus  showing  that  from  the  earliest  times  they 
understood  that  no  thought  was  possible  except  in 
a  word,  and  that  the  objects  of  our  knowledge 
became  possible  only  after  they  had  been  named. 
Their  language  passed  through  an  opposite  process 
to  that  of  Latin.  Latin  called  every  kind  of  know- 
ledge or  all  known  things  gnomina,  from  y]nosco, 
to  know  ;  but  after  a  time,  and  after  the  initial  y 
had  been  dropped,  as  we  drop  it  involuntarily  in 
gnat,  their  ynomina  became  nomina,  and  were  then 
supposed  to  be  something  different  from  the  old  and 
forgotten  ynomina ;  they  became  nomina,  i.  e.  mere 
names. 


MADHAVAS    ACCOUNT    OF    NYAYA.  493 

Six  Padarthas  of  Vaiseshika. 

According  to  the  Vaiseshikas,  we  have  six  Pad- 
arthas, i.  e.  six  general  meanings,  categories  or  pre- 
dicates, to  which  all  words  i.  e.  all  things  can  be 
referred.  All  known  things  must  be  either  sub- 
stances (9),  qualities  (24),  or  motions,  the  last 
meaning,  however,  more  than  mere  local  movement, 
so  as  to  correspond  in  fact  to  our  activity  or  even 
to  our  becoming  (Werden).  Knowledge  (Buddhi) 
is  here  treated  as  one  of  the  qualities  of  the  soul, 
which  itself  is  one  of  the  substances,  so  that  many 
things  which  with  us  belong  to  psychology  and  logic, 
are  treated  by  the  Vaiseshikas  under  this  head. 

The  next  two,  the  general  and  the  particular,  com- 
prehend what  is  shared  in  common  by  many  objects, 
and  what  is  peculiar  to  one,  and  thus  distinguishes 
it  from  all  others. 

Samavaya  or  intimate  connection  is  a  very  useful 
name  for  a  connection  between  things  which  cannot 
exist  one  without  the  other,  such  as  cause  and 
effect,  parts  and  the  whole,  and  the  like.  It  comes 
very  near  to  the  Avinabhava,  i.  e.  the  Not-without- 
being,  and  should  be  carefully  distinguished  from 
mere  conjunction  or  succession. 

The  seventh  category,  Abhava,  or  negation,  was 
added,  it  would  seem,  at  a  later  time,  and  can  be 
applied  to  previous,  to  present  or  to  subsequent 
non-existence,  or  even  to  absolute  Abhava. 

Madhava's  Account  of  Nyaya. 

In  order  to  see  what,  in  the  eyes  of  native 
scholars,  the  Nyaya-philosophy  was  meant  to  achieve, 
it  may  be  useful  to  look  at  an  account  of  it  given 


494  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

by  the  great  Madhava/iarya  in  his  Sarvadarsana- 
sa?ttgraha,  the  compendium  of  all  the  systems  of 
philosophy.  '  The  Nyaya-sastra,'  he  says,  '  consists 
of  five  books,  and  each  book  contains  two  daily 
portions  or  Ahnikas.  In  the  first  Ahnika  of  the 
first  book  the  venerable  Gotama  discusses  the 
definitions  of  nine  subjects,  beginning  with  "  proof" 
(Pramana),  and  in  the  second  those  of  the  remaining 
seven,  beginning  with  discussion  (Vada).  In  the 
first  daily  portion  of  the  second  book  he  examines 
doubt  (8),  discusses  the  four  kinds  of  proof,  and 
refutes  all  objections  that  could  be  made  against 
their  being  considered  as  instruments  of  right  know- 
ledge ;  and  in  the  second  he  shows  that  "  presump- 
tion "  and  other  Pramanas  are  really  included  in  the 
four  kinds  of  "  proof"  already  given.  In  the  first 
daily  portion  of  the  third  book  he  examines  the 
soul,  the  body,  the  senses,  and  their  objects  ;  in  the 
second,  "understanding  "  (Buddhi)  and  mind  (Manas). 
In  the  first  daily  portion  of  the  fourth  book  he 
examines  activity  (Prav?"itti),  faults  (Dosha),  trans- 
migration (Pretyabhava),  fruit  or  reward  (Phala), 
pain  (Du/ikha),  and  final  liberation  (Apavarga)  ;  in 
the  second  he  investigates  the  truth  as  to  the 
causes  of  the  "  faults,"  and  also  the  subject  of 
"wholes"  and  "parts."  In  the  first  daily  portion 
of  the  fifth  book  he  discusses  the  various  kinds  of 
futility  (Giiti),  and  in  the  second  the  various  kinds 
of  objectionable  proceedings  (Nigrahasthana).' 

After  having  held  out  in  the  first  Sutra  the 
promise  of  eternal  salvation  to  all  who  study  his 
philosophy  properly,  Gotama  proceeds  at  once  to 
a  description  of  the  steps  by  which  the  promised 
Ni//.vreyasa,  or  highest  happiness,  is  to  be  attained, 


MADHAVAS    ACCOUNT    OP    NYAYA.  495 

namely  by  the  successive  annihilation  of  false  know- 
ledge, of  faults,  of  activity,  and,  in  consequence,  of 
birth  and  suffering.  When  the  last  or  suffering  has 
been  annihilated  there  follows  ipso  facto  freedom, 
or  blessedness  (Apavarga),  literally  abstersion  or 
purification.  This  process  reminds  us  strongly  of 
some  of  the  links  in  the  PadM^a  Samuppada  of  the 
Buddhists.  This  is  generally  translated  by  Chain 
of  Causation,  and  was  meant  to  sum  up  the  causes 
of  existence  or  of  misery,  the  twelve  Nidanas.  It 
really  means  origin  resting  on  something  else.  The 
first  step  is  Avidya  or  that  cosmic  Nescience  which 
was  so  fully  elaborated  in  the  Vedanta-philosophy. 
According  to  the  Buddhists  there  follow  on  Avidya 
the  Samkharas  ],  all  the  varieties  of  existence  ;  on 
these  Vi(/?lana,  sensation ;  on  this  Namarupa, 
names  and  forms  ;  on  these  the  Shac/ayatana,  the 
six  organs  of  perception.  Then  follow  in  succes- 
sion Sparsa,  contact,  Vedana,  sensation,  THstma, 
desire,  Upadana,  attachment,  Bhava,  state  of  exis- 
tence, 6rati,  birth,  (^aramarana,  decay  and  death, 
/S'oka,  sorrow,  Parideva,  lamentation,  Du^kha,  suf- 
fering, Daurmanasya,  grief,  and  Upayasa,  despair  2. 

This  chain  of  successive  states  proclaimed  by 
Buddha  has  formed  the  subject  of  ever  so  many 
commentaries,  none  of  which  seems  quite  satisfac- 
tory. The  chain  of  Gotama  is  shorter  than  that  of 
Gautama,  but  the  general  likeness  can  hardly  be 
mistaken.  Who  was  the  earlier  of  the  two,  Gotama 
or  Gautama,  is  still  a  contested  question,  but  what- 
ever the  age  of  our  Sutras  (the  sixteen  topics)  may 

1  Cf.  Garbe,  Samkhya-Philosopliie,  p.  269  seq. 

2  Cf.  Childers,  s.v. 


496  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

be,  a  Nyaya-philosophy  existed  clearly  before  the 
rise  of  Buddhism. 

I.     Pramawa. 

Gotama  proceeds  next  to  examine  each  of  the 
sixteen  topics. 

The  first  topic  or  Padartha  is  Pramana,  which  is 
said  to  consist  of  four  kinds,  all  being  means  or 
measures  of  knowledge.  They  are  in  the  Nyaya 
as  in  the  Vaiseshika,  (i)  Pratyaksha,  sense-percep- 
tion ;  (2)  Anumana,  inference  ;  (3)  Upamana,  com- 
parison; and  (4)  /Sabda,  word. 

Perception  or  Pratyaksha. 

1.  Perception  (Pratyaksha)  is  explained  as  know- 
ledge produced  by  actual  contact  between  an  organ 
of  sense  and  its  corresponding  object,  this  object 
being  supposed  to   be  real.      How  a  mere  passive 
impression,  supposing  the  contiguity  of  the  organs 
of  sense  with  outward  objects  had  once  been  estab- 
lished, can  be   changed  into  a  sensation  or  into  a 
presentation  (Vorstellung) ,  or  what  used  to  be  called 
a  material  idea,  is  a  question  not  even  asked  by 
Gotama. 

Inference  or  Anumana. 

2.  Inference  (Anumana),  preceded  by  perception, 
is  described  as  of  three  kinds,  Purvavat,  proceeding 
from  what  was  before,  i.e.  an  antecedent ;  *Seshavat, 
proceeding  from  what  was  after,  i.  e.  a  consequent ; 
and  Samanyato   Dn'shYa,  proceeding   from  what  is 
constantly    seen    together.       Though,    as   we    saw, 
the    A7irvaka   rejects   every   kind    of  Anumana  or 
inference,    he,    as    Va£aspati    Mi.sra    remarks    very 
acutely  (Karika  5),  in  attacking  his  antagonists  for 


INFERENCE,    OR    ANUMANA.  497 

their  mistaken  faith  in  inference,  does  really  himself 
rely  on  inference,  without  which  he  could  not  so 
much  as  surmise  that  his  antagonists  held  erroneous 
opinions,  such  erroneous  opinions  being  never  brought 
into  contact  with  his  organs  of  sense,  but  being  sup- 
posed to  exist  on  the  strength  of  Anumana. 

The  meaning  of  the  three  kinds  of  inference  differs 
considerably  according  to  different  commentators. 
It  is  generally  explained  that  a  Purvavat,  preceded 
by  or  possessed  of  a  prius,  refers  to  the  mutual 
relation  between  a  sign  and  what  is  signified  by  it, 
so  that  the  observation  of  the  sign  leads  to  the 
observation  or  rather  inference  of  what  is  universally 
associated  with  it  or  marked  by  it.  This  uncon- 
ditional association  is  afterwards  treated  under  the 
name  of  Vyapti,  literally  pervasion  of  one  thing  by 
another.  Examples  will  make  this  clearer.  When 
we  see  a  river  rising  we  infer  as  its  Purva  or  prius 
that  it  has  rained.  When  we  see  that  the  ants 
carry  their  eggs,  or  that  the  peacocks  are  screaming, 
we  infer  as  the  $esha  or  posterior  that  it  will  rain. 
(Nyaya  S.  II,  5,  37).  It  is  true  that  in  all  these 
cases  the  reason  given  for  an  inference  may  what 
is  called,  wander  away,  that  is,  may  prove  too  much 
or  too  little.  In  that  case  the  fault  arises  from  the 
conditioned  character  of  the  Vyapti  or  the  pervasion. 
Thus  the  rising  of  a  river  may  be  due  to  its  having 
been  dammed  up,  the  carrying  off  their  eggs  by  the 
ants  may  have  been  caused  by  some  accidental  dis- 
turbance of  their  hill,  and  the  screaming  of  the 
peacocks  may  really  have  been  imitated  by  men. 
The  fault,  however,  in  such  cases  does  not  affect  the 
process  of  inference,  but  the  Vyapti  only  ;  and  as 
soon  as  the  relation  between  the  sign  and  the 

Kk 


498  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

thing  signified  has  been  rectified,  the  inference  will 
come  right.  Each  Vyapti,  that  is  each  inductive 
truth,  consists  of  a  sign  (Linga),  and  the  bearer 
of  a  sign  (Lingin).  The  bearer  of  the  sign  is  called 
Vyapaka  or  pervading,  the  sign  itself  Vyapya,  what 
is  to  be  pervaded.  Thus  smoke  is  the  sign  (Linga, 
Vyapya),  and  fire  is  what  pervades  the  smoke,  is 
always  present  when  there  is  smoke,  is  the  sine  qud 
non  of  smoke,  is  therefore  Lingin  or  Vyapaka. 

But  everything  depends  on  whether  the  two  are 
either  absolutely  or  only  conditionally  related.  These 
conditions  are  called  the  Upadhis.  Thus  the  rela- 
tion between  fire  and  smoke  is  conditioned  by  damp 
firewood  ;  and  there  are  other  cases  also  where  fire 
exists  without  smoke,  as  in  a  red-hot  iron  ball. 

The  third  kind  of  inference,  the  Samanyato 
Drishta,  based  on  what  is  constantly  seen  together, 
is  illustrated  by  our  inferring  that  the  sun  is  moving 
because  it  is  seen  in  different  places,  everything 
that  is  seen  in  different  places  being  known  to  have 
moved.  Here  the  Vyapti,  on  which  the  ancient 
logicians  depended,  had  to  wait  till  it  was  corrected 
by  Copernicus. 

Even  a  deaf  man  may  infertile  existence  of  sound 
if  he  sees  a  particular  conjunction  of  a  drumstick 
with  a  drum.  It  requires  but  a  certain  amount  of 
experience  to  infer  the  presence  of  an  ichneumon 
from  seeing  an  excited  snake,  or  to  infer  fire  from 
perceiving  the  heat  of  water,  nay  to  infer  the  exis- 
tence of  an  organ  of  touch  from  our  feeling  any 
animated  body.  In  all  such  cases  the  correctness 
of  the  inference  is  one  thing,  the  truth  of  the  con- 
clusion quite  another,  the  latter  being  always  condi- 
tioned by  the  presence  or  absence  of  certain  Upadhis. 


INFERENCE,    OR    ANUMANA.  499 

Different  from  this  very  natural  explanation  of 
the  three  kinds  of  Anumana  is  another,  according 
to  which  >Sesha  is  not  supposed  to  mean  subsequent 
effect,  allowing  us  to  infer  its  invariable  cause,  but 
is  to  be  taken  in  the  sense  of  what  is  left.  This  is 
illustrated  by  an  example,  such  as  '  Earth  is  dif- 
ferent from  all  other  elements,  because  it  alone  pos- 
sesses the  quality  of  smell,'  that  is  to  say,  earth  is 
left  over,  being  separated  from  all  other  elements 
by  its  peculiar  quality  of  smell.  One  might  have 
inferred  from  the  fact  that  the  element  of  earth 
possesses  smell,  that  all  elements  possessed  the  same. 
But  this  is  wrong,  because  it  is  Aprasakta,  i.e.  does 
not  apply.  It  would  be  no  better  than  if  we  were 
to  infer  that  smell  must  belong  to  other  qualities 
and  actions  also,  which  would  be  simply  absurd. 
But  as  earth  is  different  from  all  other  substances, 
we  may  infer  that  smell  does  not  belong  to  anything 
that  is  not  earth,  except  artificially,  as  in  scented 
articles.  This  is  the  residuary  inference,  or  method 
of  residues. 

In  the  same  manner  we  are  told  that  Purva,  the 
prius,  should  not  be  taken  in  the  sense  of  antecedent 
cause,  but  as  a  general  concept  the  properties  of  which 
have  been  formerly  comprehended  as  known.  Thus 
from  smoke  on  a  hill  we  should  infer  the  presence  of 
a  particular  fire  on  the  hill,  falling  under  the  general 
concept  of  fire  as  belonging  to  the  genus  fire. 

The  third,  or  Sarnanyato  Drishta,  inference,  is 
illustrated  by  our  inferring  the  existence  of  senses, 
which  are  by  themselves  imperceptible  (Indriya/a 
Atindriyani),  because  we  do  perceive  colour  &c.,  and 
as  no  actions  can  take  place  without  instruments 
we  may  infer  the  existence  of  senses  as  instruments 

K  k  2 


500  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

for  our  action  of  seeing,  &c.  Samanyato  Dn'shte,  thus 
becomes  very  like  the  seeing  of  a  general  concept. 
It  is  inference  from  the  sensible  to  the  supersensible. 

With  all  respect  for  native  commentators,  both 
ancient  and  modern,  I  must  confess  that  I  prefer 
the  more  natural  explanation  of  the  three  kinds  of 
inference  being  based  on  cause,  effect,  and  associa- 
tion, nay  I  find  it  difficult  to  understand  why  this 
view  should  have  been  given  up  by  the  modern 
Naiyayikas. 

Among  these  three  inferences,  the  first  and  last 
are  called  Vita  or  straightforward,  the  second  Avita, 
or  not  straightforward  ;  but  this  only  if  we  adopt  the 
second  explanation  of  the  three  kinds  of  Anumana. 

We  shall  have  to  deal  again  with  Anumana 
when  we  come  to  consider  the  seventh  Padartha, 
the  Avayavas  or  Premisses,  or  what  we  should 
call  the  members  of  a  syllogism. 

Comparison  or  Anumana. 

3.  Next    follows    Comparison   (Upamana)    or   re- 
cognition  of  likeness,   explained  as  an  instrument 
for  ascertaining  what  has  to  be  ascertained  by  means 
of  similarity  with    something    well   known    before. 
For  instance,  having  been  told  that  a  Gavaya  (bos 
gavaeus)   is  like  a  cow,  and  seeing  an  animal  like 
a  cow,  but  not  a  cow,  a  man  may  infer  that  it  is 
a  Gavaya. 

Word  or  Sabda. 

4.  Word  ($abda)   is   explained   either  as  a  pre- 
cept   of  one  worthy   to  be   trusted,   or  as  a  right 
precept.      It  refers,  we  are  told,  either  to  visible  or 
invisible  objects.     It  is  curious  to  see  that  among 
the  people  to  be  trusted  (Apta)  the  commentator 


FRAME  YA.  501 

should  mention  not  only  Rishis  and  Aryas,  but 
MleMAas  or  barbarians  also,  provided  they  are  well 
informed.  Strictly  speaking  the  Veda  would  not 
come  under  £abda,  unless  it  can  be  proved  to  be 
AptavaA-ana,  the  word  of  one  worthy  to  be  trusted. 

II.     Prameya. 

The  second  Padartha  or  topic  is  Prameya,  that  is, 
all  that  can  be  established  by  the  four  Pramanas, 
or  what  we  should  call  omne  scibile.  Twelve 
such  objects  are  mentioned:  (i)  Self  or  soul,  (2) 
body,  (3)  senses,  (4)  sense-objects,  (5)  understand- 
ing, (6)  mind,  (7)  activity  (will),  (8)  faults,  (9)  trans- 
migration, (10)  rewards  of  deeds,  (u)  suffering,  (12) 
final  beatitude.  The  first  six  of  these  are  called  causa- 
tive, the  other  six  caused.  Gotama  next  proceeds 
to  define  each  of  these  Prameyas,  by  enumerating 
the  characteristics  peculiar  to  each. 

1.  The    characteristics    of  the    Self  are    desire, 
hatred,  will,  pleasure,  pain,  and  knowing  (Buddhi). 

2 .  Body  is  defined  as  the  seat  of  action,  of  the  senses, 
and  what  they  intimate,  that  is,  their  objects  1. 

3.  The  senses  or  organs  of  sense  are  defined  as 
those  of  smell,  taste,  sight,  touch,  and  hearing.    They 
are  supposed  to  arise  from  the  elements. 

4.  These  elements  (from  which  the  senses  draw 
their  origin  and  their  perceptions)  are  earth,  water, 
light,  air,  and  ether  ;  while  the  objects  of  the  senses 
are  the  qualities  of  earth,  &c.,  such  as  odour,  savour, 
colour,   touch,    and    sound.      It   is    essential   to   re- 
member that  of  the  elements  the  first  four  are  both 

1  According  to  the  commentary  the  sensations,  and  according 
to  the  next  Sutra,  the  qualities  of  the  objects  of  sense,  which 
alone  can  be  perceived. 


502  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

eternal  and  non-eternal,  while  the  fifth,  Akasa,  which 
we  translate  by  ether,  is  eternal  only,  and  hence 
not  tangible.  The  non-eternal  substances  are  either 
inorganic,  organic,  or  sensitive,  but  always  related 
to  the  sense,  so  that  the  sense  of  light  perceives  or 
sees  light  only.  The  sense  of  scent  perceives  odour 
only,  and  so  on. 

5.  As    to    Buddhi,    understanding,    it  is    by  the 
Naiyayikas  explained  as  being  the  same  as  appre- 
hension or  knowledge,  and  as  being  twofold,  notion, 
Anubhava,  and  remembrance,  Smarana. 

6.  Mind  (Manas)  is  different  from  understanding, 
and  is  explained  as  that  which  prevents  more  than 
one  notion  from  arising  at  the  same  time,  that  is  to 
say,  it  prevents  the  rushing  in  of  all  sorts  of  sensuous 
impressions  at  once,  and  regulates  them  in  our  con- 
sciousness.    It  is  sometimes  called  the  gatekeeper 
or  controller  of  the  senses.     The  transformation  of 
sensations  into  percepts,  and  of  percepts  into  con- 
cepts,  a  subject  little  cultivated  by  Indian  philo- 
sophers, would  naturally  fall  to  the  Manas.     Little 
attention,  however,  is   paid  by  Hindu  logicians  to 
this  subject,  which  has  assumed  such  large  propor- 
tions with  us.    Even  the  distinction  between  percepts, 
Vorstellungen,  and  concepts,  Bcgriffe,  lias  never  been 
fully  realised  by  Indian  logicians. 

Manas  or  mind  is  considered  as  A/m  or  an  atom, 
and  the  question  has  been  fully  discussed  how  Manas, 
being  A?m,  can  be  united  with  Atman,  which  is  Vibhu, 
or  infinitely  great.  If,  with  the  Mimawsakas,  it 
were  admitted  that  the  two  could  unite,  then  there 
could  never  be  any  cessation  of  knowledge,  such  as 
we  know  there  is  in  sleep,  for  the  union  of  Atman 
and  Manas,  if  once  effected,  would  be  indissoluble. 


PRAMEYA.  503 

It  is  held  by  the  Naiyayikas  that  when  Manas 
enters  a  particular  region  of  the  body  called  Puri- 
tat,  the  effect  of  the  union  of  Atman  and  Manas  is 
neutralised,  and  sleep  ensues.  If  Manas  were  sup- 
posed to  be  co-extensive  with  the  body  it  would 
be  Anitya,  non-eternal,  and  be  destroyed  with  the 
body,  and  we  should  lose  that  which  retains  the 
impressions  of  acts  done  in  the  body,  nay  we  should 
be  unable  to  account  for  a  future  life  and  the  in- 
equalities of  birth  in  any  future  life  ;  we  should 
have  to  admit,  in  fact,  effects  without  a  cause. 
The  Naiyayikas  hold,  therefore,  that  the  Manas  is 
both  Anu,  infinitely  small,  and  Nitya,  eternal  (Tarka- 
kaumudi,  p.  4,  n.  24),  while  Manas,  like  Atman,  is 
eternal  and  numerous,  differing,  however,  from 
Atman  by  being  atomic  in  dimension. 

7.  Activity   (will)   is  the  effort  of  body,   of  the 
understanding  working  through  the  mind  (Manas), 
and  of  the  voice. 

8.  Faults  cause  acts,  and  acts  bear  fruit,  good  or 
bad1. 

9.  Pretyabhava  is  transmigration. 

10.  Rewards  are  results  produced  by  faults,   in 
the  most  general  sense,  and  by  actions  consequent 
on  them,  so  that  they  are  sometimes  explained  as 
consciousness  of  pleasure  and  pain. 

1 1 .  Pain    is   characterised  by   vexation  ;  and   as 
pleasure  also  involves  pain,  both  pain  and  pleasure 
are  here  treated  together  under  pain.     Entire  de- 
liverance from  pain  and  pleasure  is 

12.  Apavarga  or  final  beatitude. 

Having   thus   examined   all   that    can  form    the 

1  See  I,  20,  Pravnttidosha<7anitartha/i  phalam. 


504  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

object  of  our  knowledge,  the  Pramanas  or  measures 
of  knowledge,  and  the  Prameyas,  we  now  enter  on 
the  third  of  the  sixteen  topics. 

III.    Samsaya. 

Sa?nsaya  or  doubt.  Doubt,  we  are  told,  arises 
from  our  recognition  of  various  attributes  opposed 
to  one  another  in  one  and  the  same  object,  as 
when  we  recognise  in  a  distant  object  the  quali- 
ties of  a  man  and  of  a  post.  The  definition  given 
of  doubt  shows  that  the  ancient  logicians  of  India 
had  carefully  thought  about  the  different  causes  of 
doubt,  so  that  they  were  led  to  the  admission  of 
three  or  even  five  kinds  of  it. 

IV.  Prayo^rana.     V.  Dnsh^anta.     VI.  Siddhanta. 

But  these  disquisitions,  as  well  as  those  referring 
to  (IV)  Prayo^ana,  purpose  or  motive ;  (V)  D?*ish- 
£anta,  example,  familiar  case  ;  (VI)  Siddhanta,  tenets, 
contain  nothing  that  is  of  peculiar  interest  to  the 
historian  of  philosophy,  except  so  far  as  they  offer 
once  more  the  clearest  evidence  of  a  long  continued 
previous  study  of  logic  in  the  ancient  schools  or 
settlements  of  India. 

VII.     The  Avayavas,  or  Members  of  a  Syllogism. 

Much  more  important  is  the  next  subject,  the 
so-called  members,  that  is,  the  members  of  a  syllo- 
gism. To  us  a  syllogism  and  its  structure  are  so 
familiar  that  we  hardly  feel  surprised  at  meeting 
with  it  in  the  schools  of  logic  in  India.  Yet,  unless 
we  are  inclined  to  admit  either  an  influence  of 
Greek  on  Indian,  or  of  Indian  on  Greek  philosophy, 
neither  of  which  has  as  yet  been  proved,  the  coin- 


INDIAN    AND    GREEK    LOGIC.  505 

cidences  between  the  two  are  certainly  startling. 
As  to  myself  I  feel  bound  to  confess  that  I  see  no 
evidence  of  any  direct  influence,  either  on  one  side 
or  on  the  other ;  and  though  I  am  far  from  denying 
its  possibility,  I  keep  to  my  conviction,  expressed 
many  years  ago,  that  we  must  here  also  admit  the 
existence  of  undesigned  coincidences  to  a  much 
larger  extent  than  our  predecessors  were  inclined 
to  do.  We  must  never  forget  that  what  has  been 
possible  in  one  country,  is  possible  in  another  also. 

At  the  time  when  the  different  systems  of  Indian 
philosophy  became  first  known  to  the  scholars  of 
Europe  everything  that  came  from  the  East  was 
looked  upon  as  of  extreme  antiquity.  There  had 
been  vague  traditions  of  ancient  Indian  philosophy 
even  before  the  time  of  Aristotle.  Alexander  him- 
self, we  are  told,  was  deeply  impressed  with  that 
idea,  as  we  may  gather  from  his  desire  to  communi- 
cate with  the  gymnosophists  of  India. 

Indian  and  Greek  Logic. 

One  of  these  gymnosophists  or  Digambaras  seems 
to  have  been  the  famous  Kalanos  (Kalyana  T),  who 
died  a  voluntary  death  by  allowing  himself  to  be 
burnt  before  the  eyes  of  the  Macedonian  army.  It 
was  readily  admitted,  therefore,  by  European  scholars 
that  the  Hindu  systems  of  philosophy,  and  particu- 
larly Indian  Logic,  were  more  ancient  than  that  of 
Aristotle,  and  that  the  Greeks  had  borrowed  the 
first  elements  of  their  philosophy  from  the  Hindus. 

The  view  that  Alexander  might  actually  have 
sent  some  Indian  philosophical  treatises  to  his  tutor 
at  home,  and  this  even  at  a  time  when,  as  far  as  we 
know  at  present,  manuscripts  in  India  were  still 


506  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

unknown,  and  that  Aristotle  might  have  worked 
them  up  into  a  system,  inconceivable  as  it  now 
seems  to  us,  was  taken  up  and  warmly  defended  by 
men  like  Gorres  and  others.  Gorres  undertook  to 
prove  that  the  Greeks  had  actually  retained  some 
technical  terms  taken  from  Sanskrit.  For  instance, 
as  Indian  philosophers  admit  five  elements,  the  fifth 
being  called  Akasa,  ether,  Gorres,  without  giving 
any  reference,  quoted  a  passage  from  Aristotle  in 
which  he  speaks  of  a  fifth  element  and  calls  it 
dKa.T-ov6fj.aTov,  i.  e.  akds-nominatum,  this  being  prob- 
ably an  ingenious  conjecture  for  aKarovo^aa-Tov  \  It 
is  quite  true  that  one  such  verbal  coincidence  would 
settle  the  whole  question,  but  even  that  one  coin- 
cidence has  not  yet  been  discovered.  No  doubt 
there  were  many  points  of  coincidence  between 
Greek  and  Indian  logic,  but  none  in  technical 
terms,  which,  like  proper  names  in  Comparative 
Mythology,  would  have  clinched  the  argument  once 
for  all. 

But  does  it,  on  the  other  hand,  show  a  higher 
power  of  historical  criticism,  if  Niebuhr  and  others 
stood  up  for  the  opposite  view  and  tried  to  derive 
Indian  philosophy  from  Greece  ?  Niebuhr  is  reported 
to  have  said  in  his  Lectures  on  Ancient  History, 
'  If  we  look  at  Indian  philosophy  we  discern  traces 
of  a  great  similarity  with  that  of  the  Greeks.  Now 
as  people  have  given  up  the  hypothesis  that  Greek 
philosophy  formed  itself  after  Indian  philosophy,  we 
cannot  explain  this  similarity  except  by  the  inter- 


1  Plutarch,    De   Placit.   Philos.,    quotes  Epicurus   us   to   the 
HOU!  being  a  mixture  of  three  elements,  fire,  air,  and  water, 

<Uld     &    fourth     UKUTOVO/AaOTOV,     O    r/V    UVTU>    CUCT^TIKOV. 


INDIAN    AND    GREEK    LOGIC.  507 

course  which  the  Indians  had  with  the  Graeco- 
Macedonic  kingdom  of  Bactra.' 

Is  that  really  so  ?  To  Niebuhr  and  to  most 
Greek  scholars  it  would  naturally  seem  next  to 
impossible  that  Greek  philosophy,  which  can  be 
watched  from  its  first  childhood,  should  have  been 
of  foreign  origin,  a  mere  importation  from  India. 
They  know  how  Greek  philosophy  grew  up  gradually, 
how  its  growth  ran  parallel  with  the  progress  of 
Grecian  poetry,  religion,  art,  and  civilisation.  They 
feel  it  to  be  a  home-grown  production,  as  certainly 
as  Plato  and  Aristotle  were  Greeks  and  not 
Brahmans. 

But  they  ought  not  to  be  surprised  if  Sanskrit 
scholars  have  just  the  same  feeling  with  regard  to 
Indian  philosophy.  They  also  can  show  how  in 
India  the  first  philosophical  ideas,  as  yet  in  a  very 
vague  and  shadowy  form,  show  themselves  in  the 
hymns  of  the  early  poets  of  the  Veda.  They  can 
trace  their  gradual  development  in  the  Brahmanas 
and  Upanishads.  They  can  show  how  they  gave 
rise  to  discussions,  public  and  private,  how  they 
assumed  a  more  and  more  definite  form,  and  how 
at  last  they  were  fixed  in  different  schools  in  that 
form  in  which  they  have  reached  us.  They,  too, 
are  as  certain  that  philosophy  was  autochthonous  in 
India  as  that  Gotama  and  Ka?iada  were  Brahmans 
and  not  Greeks. 

What  then  remains  ?  It  seems  to  me  that  until 
it  can  be  proved  historically  that  the  Greeks  could 
freely  converse  with  Indians  in  Greek  or  in  Sanskrit 
on  metaphysical  subjects  or  vice  versa,  or  until 
technical  philosophical  terms  can  be  discovered  in 
Sanskrit  of  Greek,  or  in  Greek  of  Sanskrit  origin, 


508  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

it  will  be  best  to  accept  facts  and  to  regard  both 
Greek  and  Indian  philosophy  as  products  of  the 
intellectual  soil  of  India  and  of  Greece,  and  derive 
from  their  striking  similarities  this  simple  conviction 
only,  that  in  philosophy  also  there  is  a  wealth  of 
truth  which  forms  the  common  heirloom  of  all  man- 
kind, and  may  be  discovered  by  all  nations  if  they 
search  for  it  with  honesty  and  perseverance. 

Having  once  learnt  this  lesson  we  shall  feel  less 
inclined,  whenever  we  meet  with  coincidences  of 
any  kind,  to  conclude  at  once  that  they  cannot  be 
explained  except  by  admitting  a  historical  contact 
and  a  borrowing  on  one  side  or  the  other1.  No 
doubt  there  are  the  Vaiseshika  categories  =  Padar- 
thas,  there  is  Dravya,  substance,  Guna,  quality ; 
there  is  genus  =  Samanya,  and  species  =  Visesha, 
nay,  even  syllogism  =  the  Avayavas  ;  there  is  induc- 
tion =  Vyapti,  and  deduction  =  Upanaya,  both  in 
Sanskrit  and  in  Greek.  But  why  not  ?  If  they 
could  be  developed  naturally  in  Greece,  why  not 
in  India  ?  Anyhow,  we  must  wait  and  not  hamper 
the  progress  of  research  by  premature  assertions. 

VIII.     Tarka. 

But  before  we  enter  into  the  intricacies  of  the 
Indian  syllogism,  it  will  be  best  to  finish  first  what 
remains  of  the  sixteen  topics  of  the  Nyaya.  After 
the  five  members  follows  VIII,  Tarka,  which  is  ex- 
plained as  refutation,  or  reasoning  from  the  fitness 
of  the  case,  as  when  a  person,  though  seeing  smoke 
on  a  hill,  does  not  see  that  there  must  be  fire,  and  is 

1  See  M.  M.,  On  Coincidences,  a  paper  read  before  the  Royal 
Society  of  Literature,  1896. 


NIRA7AYA,    ETC.  509 

thereupon  made  to  see  that  if  the  hill  were  without 
fire,  it  would  of  necessity  be  without  smoke.  It  is 
meant  to  be  a  reductio  ad  absurdum. 

IX.     Nirwaya. 

The  next  topic  to  be  considered  is  IX,  Nimaya, 
ascertainment. 

X-XVI.     Vada,  £alpa,  Vitawda,  Hetvabhasa,  £ati, 
,  Nigrahasthana. 


Then  follow  the  paragraphs  connected  with 
rhetoric  or  eristics  rather  than  with  logic,  such  as 
X,  Vada  or  argumentation,  consisting  of  objections 
and  answers,  both  disputants,  however,  caring  for 
truth  only  ;  next  XI,  (ralpa,  sophistical  wrangling 
or  attacking  what  has  been  established,  by  means 
of  fraud  ;  XIV,  6rati,  futility,  arising  from  false 
analogies  ;  XV,  Kh&la,,  quibbling  ;  and  XVI,  Nigra- 
hasthana, unfitness  for  discussion.  In  the  last  five 
cases  disputants  are  supposed  to  care  for  victory 
only,  and  not  for  truth. 

If  this  wrangling  is  devoid  of  any  attempt  at 
really  establishing  an  opposite  opinion,  it  is  called 
XII,  Vitanc&i,  cavilling. 

We  next  come  to  XIII,  Hetvabhasas,  or  specious 
arguments,  that  is,  paralogisms  and  sophisms.  These 
are  SavyabbiMra,  arguments  that  prove  too  much, 
Viruddha,  that  prove  the  reverse,  Prakaranasama, 
that  tell  equally  on  both  sides,  Sadhyasama,  that  stand 
themselves  in  need  of  proof,  and  Kalatita,  mistimed. 

As  to  XV,  Khsila,,  fraud  in  using  words  in  a 
sense  different  from  what  is  generally  understood, 
and  XIV,  (7ati,  futility  arising  from  change  of  class, 
they  have  been  mentioned  before.  It  is  difficult  to 


510  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

understand  why  6rati,  i.  e.  birth  or  genus,  should 
mean  a  futile  argument,  unless  it  meant  originally 
a  transitio  in  alterum  genus,  as  when,  in  answer  to 
an  argument  that  a  man  is  unable  to  travel,  because 
he  has  a  fever,  it  should  be  answered  that  he  is  able 
to  travel,  because  he  is  a  soldier.  Here  the  same 
man  is  referred  first  to  the  class  of  those  who  suffer 
from  fever,  and  then  to  that  of  soldiers  who  are 
always  supposed  to  be  able  to  march. 

The  last,  XVI,  Nigrahasthana,  unfitness  for  dis- 
cussion, is  when  a  man  by  misunderstanding  or  not 
understanding,  yet  continuing  to  talk,  renders  him- 
self liable  to  reproof. 

This  may  seem  a  long  list,  though  in  several  cases 
there  are  subdivisions  which  have  here  been  left  out, 
and  yet  at  the  end  of  the  list  Gotama  actually 
apologises  and  says  that  there  are  many  more  sorts 
of  futility,  &c.,  which  have  been  passed  over  by  him, 
but  will  have  to  be  discussed  hereafter. 

Judgments  on  Indian  Logic. 

If  we  were  to  look  upon  this  list  of  the  sixteen 
topics,  as  some  have  done,  as  an  abstract  of  Gotama's 
whole  philosophy,  or  with  others,  as  his  table  of  the 
categories,  European  philosophers  would  no  doubt 
be  justified  in  saying  what  Hitter  said  in  his 
History  of  Philosophy  that  the  exposition  of  the 
Nyaya  is  tedious,  loose,  and  unmethodical.  It  is 
certainly  mixed  up  with  subjects  which  have  nothing 
to  do  with  pure  logic,  but  so  was  Greek  logic  in  its 
beginning,  in  the  school  of  Zeno,  for  instance.  It 
may  be  also  too  minute  for  our  taste,  but  it  cannot 
be  called  loose  at  the  same  time.  It  is  equally 
unfair  to  charge  the  Nyaya  and  all  the  other 


JUDGMENTS    ON    INDIAN    LOGIC.  5!  I 

systems  of  Indian  philosophy,  with  being  un- 
practical and  with  entirely  ignoring  all  the  problems 
of  ethics.  We  must  remember  that  philosophy  in 
India  had  very  different  antecedents  from  what  it 
had  with  us.  We  ourselves  can  hardly  conceive 
a  philosophy  which  in  the  end  is  not  to  be  of 
practical  usefulness,  and  which  ignores  all  questions 
of  morality.  But  we  must  learn  to  take  philo- 
sophers as  they  are.  Morality  with  the  Brahmans 
depends  either  on  prescriptive  sacra  (Dharma),  or  on 
what  is  called  Samaya,  the  agreement  of  good  people. 
But  its  strongest  support  is  a  firm  belief  in  the  soli- 
darity of  life  here  and  hereafter,  and  a  firm  conviction 
that  nothing  can  ever  be  lost.  The  popular  mind  of 
India  seems  never  to  have  doubted  the  fact  that 
every  good  or  every  evil  thought  or  deed  will  grow 
and  bear  fruit,  and  that  no  one  can  ever  escape  from 
the  consequences  of  his  own  acts  and  thoughts. 
Whether  such  a  belief  is  right  or  wrong  is  not  the 
question,  but  it  produced  at  all  events  a  deep  sense 
of  responsibility.  Instead  of  complaints  about  the 
injustice  and  cruelty  of  God,  people  were  taught 
that  what  seemed  undeserved  misfortunes,  were 
fully  deserved,  were  in  fact  the  natural  conse- 
quences of  previous  acts,  and  in  one  respect  the 
safest  means  of  paying  off  all  debts.  Philosophy 
at  the  same  time  held  out  a  hope  that  in  the  end 
this  net  of  consequences  might  be  broken  through, 
and  the  Self,  enlightened  by  true  knowledge,  return 
to  whence  it  came,  return  to  himself  and  be  himself ; 
that  is,  be  again  the  Universal  Self,  free  for  ever 
from  the  chains  and  pains  of  this  transient  episode 
of  life  on  earth. 

That  highest  freedom  and  beatitude,  according  to 


512  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Indian  views,  depended  on  philosophy  or  knowledge  ; 
it  could  not  be  acquired  by  good  works  or  good 
thoughts  alone.  This  again  may  be  right  or  wrong, 
but  I  can  discover  no  looseness  of  reasoning  in  it, 
nor  in  Indian  philosophy  in  general.  We  must  not 
forget  that,  from  a  Hindu  point  of  view,  this  life  on 
earth  is  but  an  episode  that  may  be  very  important 
in  itself,  but  is  a  mere  nothing  compared  with  what 
lies  behind  and  before,  the  eternal  life  of  the  soul. 
If  they  hold  that  a  knowledge  of  the  true  relation 
between  man  and  the  world,  and  between  man  and 
the  Author  of  the  world,  is  essential  to  true  freedom 
and  tine  happiness,  are  they  so  far  wrong  ?  And  what 
is  true  in  the  case  of  the  Vedanta,  the  Samkhya  and 
Yoga  systems  of  philosophy,  is  true  in  a  certain  sense 
of  the  Nyaya  also.  It  may  be  said  that  the  funda- 
mental points  of  this  philosophy  are  contained  in  what 
can  be  known,  Prameya,  and  the  means  of  knowing, 
Prama?ia,  that  is  to  say,  it  seemed  necessary  to 
Gotama  to  establish,  first  of  all,  the  limits  of  the  two, 
just  as  Kant  began  his  philosophy  with  his  Critique 
of  Pure  Reason,  that  is,  the  tracing  of  the  limits  of 
Pure  Reason.  But  this  being  done  in  full  detail  under 
his  sixteen  headings,  Gotama  too,  like  Badaraya?ia 
and  Kapila,  enters  on  an  explanation  of  the  process 
by  which  it  was  possible  to  destroy  ignorance  or 
Mithyar/mina,  which,  as  he  holds,  is  the  true  cause 
of  error  or  sin,  '  which  is  the  cause  of  activity,  which 
is  the  cause  of  birth,  which  is  the  cause  of  suffering ' 
(I,  2).  This,  whether  right  or  wrong,  is  at  all  events 
perfectly  coherent,  nor  does  it  betray  any  looseness  of 
reasoning,  if  indirectly  the  whole  Nyaya-philosophy 
is  called  the  cause  of  final  freedom  or  blessedness. 
Modern  Nyaya  is  almost  entirely  confined  to  Pramana. 


PBATYAKSHA,    PEECEPTION.  513 

The  Later  Books  of  the  Nyftya. 

In  this  way  the  first  book  of  the  Nyaya-Sutras 
gives  us  indeed  a  fair  outline  of  the  whole  of 
Gotama's  philosophy,  while  the  following  three 
books  enter  into  a  more  minute  examination  of  its 
details.  Thus  the  second  book  treats  more  fully  of 
the  Prama?ias,  the  third  and  fourth  of  the  Prameyas, 
the  fifth  treats  of  all  that  comes  under  the  head  of 
paralogisms.  Some  of  the  questions  discussed  in 
these  books  show  quite  clearly  that  they  must  have 
formed  the  subject  of  lively  and  long-continued 
controversy,  for  though  some  of  the  objections 
raised  may  seem  to  us  of  little  importance,  they 
prove  at  all  events  the  conscientiousness  of  the 
early  Naiyayikas. 

Pratyaksha,  Perception. 

That  sensuous  perception  should  be  a  Pramarca 
or  authority  would  hardly  seem  to  us  to  have  re- 
quired further  proof.  But  Gotama  or  his  opponent 
starts  the  question,  on  what  ground  the  evidence 
of  the  senses  can  claim  such  authority,  or  who 
is  the  authority  of  its  authority.  This  is  an  idea 
that  anticipates  an  important  element  of  modern 
philosophy.  As  a  balance  may  serve  to  weigh 
a  thing,  but  must  also  be  weighed  or  tested  itself, 
it  might  be  said  that  the  authority  of  the  senses 
also  requires  to  be  established  by  another  authority, 
and  so  on  ad  infinitum.  In  answer  to  this  Gotama 
uses  what  seems  to  be  an  ad  hominem  argument, 
namely,  that  if  there  is  no  authority  anywhere, 
there  can  be  none  on  the  side  of  the  objector  either. 
The  objector  would  cut  away  the  ground  under  his 

Ll 


514  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

own    feet,   and  thus  would   himself  have  no  locus 
stanch  for  offering  any  objections  (II,  13). 

But  admitting  that  sensuous  perception  has 
authority  just  as  a  lamp  has  light  to  light  up  the 
things  around  it,  the  next  question  is  whether  the 
definition  of  sensuous  perception,  that  which  results 
from  contact  of  sense  with  its  object,  is  not  in- 
complete, because  for  real  perception  there  must  be 
contact  not  only  with  the  organs  of  sense,  but  like- 
wise between  the  senses  and  the  mind  (Manas),  and 
between  the  mind  and  the  Self  (Atman).  This  is 
not  denied  by  Gotama,  he  only  defends  himself  by 
saying  that  everything  cannot  be  said  at  the  same 
time,  and  that  his  definition  of  perception,  though 
it  dwells  only  on  what  is  essential  (the  contact  of 
sense  and  object),  does  by  no  means  exclude  that 
between  mind  and  Self,  on  the  contrary  takes  it 
here  for  granted.  He  also  admits  that  contact 
between  sense  and  object  does  not  invariably  pro- 
duce perception,  that  in  fact  there  may  be  sensation 
without  perception,  as  when  we  are  so  absorbed  in 
listening  to  music  that  we  do  not  perceive  the 
objects  around  us,  from  want  of  attention.  This 
again  reminds  us  of  modern  philosophy.  Even  such 
questions  as  to  whether  there  is  any  interval  of  time 
between  our  hearing  the  sound  of  a  word  and  our 
realising  its  meaning,  are  alluded  to  by  Gotama  and 
his  school,  and  the  question  whether  several  impres- 
sions can  be  taken  in  at  the  same  time  is  negatived 
by  a  reference  to  the  running  of  a  pin  through 
a  number  of  sheets  of  a  MS.  Here  the  piercing 
seems  simultaneous,  yet  we  know  that  it  can  only 
be  successive.  Another  question  also  which  has 
lately  occupied  our  psycho-physiologists,  whether 


TIME PRESENT,    PAST,    FUTURE.  515 

perception  does  not  involve  inference,  is  discussed 
by  Gotama  (II,  31),  particularly  in  cases  where  our 
senses  can  apprehend  a  part  only  of  their  object 
when  perceiving,  for  instance,  a  tree,  of  which  one 
side  only  can  be  seen  at  the  time,  while  the  rest  has 
to  be  supplied  by  memory  or  inference.  This  leads 
him  on  to  another  question  whether  there  really  is 
such  a  thing  as  a  whole,  and  as  we  can  in  reality 
never  see  more  than  one  side  at  a  time,  he  tries 
to  account  for  the  process  by  which  we  take  a  part 
for  the  whole.  No  one,  for  instance,  has  ever  seen 
more  than  one  side  of  the  moon,  yet  taking  it  as 
a  whole,  and  as  a  globe,  we  postulate  and  are  con- 
vinced that  there  is  another  side  also.  The  illustra- 
tion given  by  Gotama  to  show  that  a  tree  is  a  whole, 
namely,  because  when  we  shake  one  branch  of  it,  the 
whole  tree  trembles,  may  seem  childish  to  us,  but  it 
is  exactly  in  these  simple  and  so-called  childish 
thoughts  that  the  true  interest  of  ancient  philo- 
sophy seems  to  me  to  consist. 

Time — Present,  Past,  Future. 

The  next  problem  that  occupies  Gotama  is  that 
of  time — of  present,  past,  and  future.  The  objector, 
and  in  this  case,  it  seems,  a  very  real  objector,  for  it 
is  the  opinion  of  the  Buddhists,  denies  that  there  is 
such  a  thing  as  present  time,  because  the  moment 
wre  see  a  fruit  falling  from  a  tree,  we  see  only  that 
it  has  fallen  or  that  it  has  still  to  fall,  but  never 
that  it  is  falling.  Here  the  answer  is  that  past 
and  future  themselves  would  be  impossible,  if  the 
present  did  not  exist,  and  on  the  objector's  admit- 
ting such  a  possibility,  Gotama  remarks  that  in 
that  case  perception  and  all  that  springs  from  it 

Ll2 


516  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

would  be  altogether  impossible,  because  it  can  only 
depend  on  what  is  present. 

Upamana,  Comparison. 

Passing  over  what  is  said  in  this  place  about  the 
validity  of  inference,  because  we  shall  have  to  return 
to  it  hereafter,  we  find  Gotama  bent  on  establishing 
by  the  side  of  it,  by  the  side  of  Anumana,  his 
next  instrument  of  knowledge,  namely  Upamana, 
analogy  or  comparison.  And  here  Gotama  seems  in 
conflict  with  Kawada  who,  as  we  shall  see,  declines 
to  accept  Upamana,  comparison,  as  one  of  the 
independent  authoritative  evidences,  or,  at  all 
events,  as  essentially  different  from  Anumana,  in- 
ference. We  might  feel  tempted  to  conclude  from 
this  that  Gotama  must  have  been  later  in  time  than 
Kawada.  But  first  of  all,  Kanada's  name  is  not 
mentioned  here  nor  that  of  his  system,  Vaiseshika ; 
and  secondly,  we  know  that  this  question  of  the 
Pramanas  had  been  discussed  again  and  again  in 
every  school  of  Indian  philosophy,  so  that  a  mere 
reference  to  the  subject  cannot  be  used  as  deter- 
mining the  seniority  either  of  the  opponent  or  of 
the  defender.  All  we  can  say  is  that,  whenever  we 
see  Upamana  appealed  to  as  a  means  of  valid  know- 
ledge, we  know  that  we  have  to  deal  with  followers 
of  the  Nyaya  school  ;  but  the  Vaiseshika,  though 
denying  it  an  independent  place  among  the  Pra- 
manas,  would  by  no  means  reject  it,  if  presented  as 
a  kind  of  Anumana. 

Sabda,  the  Word. 

We  now  come  to  the  various  kinds  of  verbal 
testimony.  Testimony  is  said  to  be  conveyed  by 


SABDA,    THE    WORD.  517 

words,  and  by  a  sentence,  consisting  of  many  words, 
conveying  the  meaning  of  each  word  in  its  relation 
to  the  other  words.  Though  the  meaning  of  words 
is  admitted  to  be  conventional,  yet  opinions  differ 
because  some  consider  such  conventions  to  be 
eternal  or  divine,  while  others  take  them  to  be  non- 
eternal  or  human.  The  chief  authority  for  deter- 
mining the  meaning  of  a  word  is  admitted  to  be  the 
usage  of  trustworthy  persons,  but  it  is  argued  that 
as  the  highest  authority  is  Brahman  or  God,  and 
as  the  Veda  is  the  word  of  Brahman,  it  follows 
that  every  word  of  the  Veda  possesses  the  highest 
authority.  This,  however,  as  we  know,  does  not 
satisfy  the  Mimamsakas,  who  assign  eternity  to  the 
$abda  itself,  the  word  or  the  sound  of  a  word. 

In  the  examination  of  the  validity  of  /Sabda  or  word, 
we  find  again  the  same  question  started  as  before, 
whether  it  deserves  a  place  by  itself,  or  whether  it 
should  not  rather  be  treated  as  a  kind  of  inference. 
Then,  after  Gotama  has  shown  the  difference  be- 
tween '  I  know '  and  '  I  infer,'  between  acceptance  of 
the  word  of  an  authority  (Aptopadesa)  and  reliance 
on  an  inference,  he  enters  on  new  problems  such  as 
the  association  of  sense  with  sound,  a  question  which 
is  intimately  connected  with  the  question  of  what 
authority  is  due  to  the  Veda  as  the  Word  par 
excellence.  Here  we  meet  with  a  number  of  argu- 
ments in  defence  of  the  supreme  authority  of  the 
Veda  with  which  we  are  familiar  from  the  Purva- 
Mima?nsa,  but  which  again,  though  clearly  referring 
to  (raimini,  must  not  be  taken  to  prove  the  ante- 
riority of  6raimini's  Sutras  to  those  of  Gotama's,  and 
certainly  do  not  enable  us  to  admit  more  than  the 
contemporaneous  activity  of  the  various  schools  of 


518  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Hindu  philosophy  during  the  centuries  intervening 
between  the  close  of  the  Vedic  age  and  the  rise  and 
spread  of  Buddhism. 

The  Eight  Pramaflas. 

Having  defended  the  teaching  of  the  Nyaya,  that 
there  are  four  Prama/ias,  neither  more  nor  less, 
Gotama  proceeds  to  criticise  the  four  additional 
Pramawas  of  the  Mimamsakas,  and  shows  that  their 
number  is  superabundant.  They  include,  as  we 
saw,  Aitihya,  tradition,  not  necessarily  authoritative, 
Arthapatti,  assumption,  Sambhava,  probability,  and 
even  Abhava,  non-existence,  because  they  hold  that 
there  can  be  knowledge  arising  from  not-being  or 
from  absence,  as  when  we  conclude  from  the  fact 
that  Devadatta  is  not  in  his  house,  that  he  must 
have  gone  out.  Of  these  four  Prama/ias  the  first  is 
referred  by  Gotama  to  $abda,  Word,  the  others  to 
Anumana,  inference,  while  /iesh^a,  or  mere  gesture, 
as  supplying  knowledge,  may,  it  is  added,  be  classed 
either  under  Word,  like  written  letters,  or  under 
Anumana.  The  Pramanas  seem  to  have  formed  a 
subject  of  prominent  interest  to  the  Nyaya  philo- 
sophers ;  in  modern  times  they  have  absorbed  the 
whole  of  Nyaya. 

We  are  told  that  Nagaiv/una,  before  he  •  became  a 
Buddhist,  was  a  zealous  student  of  the  Nyaya-philo- 
sophy.  He  wrote  a  work,  called  Prama/ia-samuK'aya, 
which  was,  however,  supposed  to  be  lost,  till  Sarat 
Chandra  discovered  a  Tibetan  version  of  it  in  the 
library  of  the  Grand  Lama  at  Lhassa  (Journal  of 
Buddhist  Text  Society,  IV,  parts  iii  and  iv,  p.  17) '. 

1  This  would  prove  at  the  same  time  the  study  of  the  Nyaya  - 
philosophy  in  the  first  century  of  our  era  ;  see  p.  480. 


THE    EIGHT    PRAMAATAS.  519 

Here  follow  long  discussions  as  to  the  nature  of 
words,  the  difference  between  sound  (Dhvani)  and 
words,  till  we  arrive  again  at  the  question  whether 
the  word  is  eternal,  and  therefore  a  Pram&na  by 
itself,  or  not.  Similar  questions  occur  in  most  of 
the  Indian  philosophical  systems,  and  as  I  passed 
them  over  before,  it  will  be  necessary  to  examine 
them  more  fully  in  this  place,  where  we  meet  with 
them  again  as  worked  out  by  Gotama.  Though 
they  deal  with  such  purely  grammatical  questions 
as  whether  a  vowel  such  as  i  can  ever  be  changed 
into  the  semi-vowel  y,  in  fact  whether  any  letter 
can  ever  become  another  letter,  these  disquisitions 
branch  out  very  far,  and  we  shall  be  surprised  to 
see  how  intimately  in  the  minds  of  Hindu  philo- 
sophers they  are  connected  with  some  of  the  greatest 
problems  of  philosophy,  such  as  the  existence  of 
a  Creator  and  the  relation  between  the  cause  and 
the  effect  of  our  created  world. 

The  oftener  we  read  these  discussions  on  the 
eternal  character  of  sound,  on  words  and  their  true 
nature,  and  at  last  on  the  divine,  nay  transcendental 
character  of  language,  the  more  we  shall  feel  the 
difference  between  Eastern  and  Western  philosophy. 
The  true  problem  of  language  has  been  almost 
entirely  neglected  by  Greek  philosophers  and  theii 
disciples  in  Europe,  for  all  the  discussions  about  the 
(f>vo-€L  or  Secret  origin  of  language  touch  only  the  very 
hem  of  the  question,  as  it  presents  itself  to  Indian 
philosophers.  The  way  in  which  the  problem  of 
language  is  handled  by  them  will  no  doubt  be  dis- 
missed as  childish  by  modern  philosophers,  and  I  do 
not  mean  to  deny  that  some  of  their  remarks  on 
language  are  really  childish.  But  we  shall  see  that 


520  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  whole  question  is  treated  by  Hindu  philosophers 
in  a  very  serious  and  searching  spirit.  Students  of 
philosophy  should  overlook  what  may  seem  strange 
to  them  in  the  manner  of  treatment,  and  always 
try  to  keep  their  eye  on  what  is  important  and  has 
often  been  overlooked  even  by  the  greatest  thinkers 
among  us.  Language  has  been  to  most  of  us  so 
familiar  a  subject  that  we  have  hardly  perceived 
what  is  behind  it,  and  have  scarcely  asked  the 
questions  which  it  has  cost  so  much  effort  to  Indian 
philosophers  to  answer.  We  have  already  on  a  former 
occasion  examined  some  of  the  views  on  language, 
as  expressed  in  the  philosophical  hymns,  Brahma??as, 
and  Upanishads  of  the  Vedic  period.  We  have  now 
to  follow  up  these  views  as  they  are  presented  to  us 
in  a  more  systematic  form  in  the  Sfttra-period. 

Thoughts  on  Language. 

If  I  was  right  in  tracing  the  word  B?*ih,  speech,  in 
Brihas-pati,  back  to  the  same  root  as  that  of 
Brahman,  the  connection  of  the  two  ideas,  Word 
and  Creator,  would  carry  us  back  even  beyond  what 
we  call  the  Vedic  period.  At  all  events  the  idea 
that  Brahman  was  the  Word,  and  that  the  world 
was  created  by  the  Word,  existed,  as  we  saw,  long 
before  the  rise  of  philosophical  systems.  It  was 
shadowed  forth  in  the  very  language  of  India,  but 
it  received  its  full  development  in  the  Sutras  only, 
more  particularly  in  the  Vedanta-Sutras,  to  which 
we  must  return  for  our  present  purpose.  We  read 
in  Sutra  I,  3,  28  :  '  We  refute  his  objection  on  the 
ground  that  (the  world)  originates  from  the  Word, 
as  is  shown  both  by  perception  and  by  inference.' 
Perception  is  here  taken  in  the  sense  of  /S'ruti,  scrip- 


THOUGHTS    ON    LANGUAGE.  52! 

ture,  and  inference  in  the  sense  of  Smn'ti,  tradition. 
An  objection  had  been  started  that  the  Veda  could 
not  be  considered  as  eternal,  if  it  contained  names 
of  non-eternal  things,  and  as  even  the  gods,  the 
Devas,  were  looked  upon  as  non-eternal,  having  been 
proved  to  be  subject  to  birth  and  rebirth,  it  followed 
that  the  Veda,  as  containing  their  names,  could  not 
possibly  be  ante-temporal  or  eternal.  Against  this, 
though  readily  admitting  the  non-eternal  character 
of  the  gods,  the  Devas,  /Samkara  argues,  that  in 
spite  of  that,  the  gods  and  other  beings,  nay  the 
whole  world,  must  be  admitted  to  have  originated 
from  the  Word  or  the  Veda,  and  that  this  Word  is 
Brahman.  Only,  he  adds,  it  is  not  the  individuals, 
nor  this  or  that  Deva,  not  this  or  that  cow  or  horse, 
that  had  their  origin  in  the  Word,  but  the  genus  to 
which  they  belong,  that  is,  the  fify  (Akritis).  It  is 
with  the  genus  that  words  are  connected,  not  with 
individuals,  for  these,  as  being  infinite  in  number, 
are  not  capable  of  entering  into  that  connection. 
Hence  all  individual  things,  and  individual  gods 
also,  are  allowed  to  have  had  an  origin,  but  not  the 
genus  to  which  they  belong,  which  was  thought  and 
uttered  at  first  by  Brahman.  Nor  must  it  be  sup- 
posed that  the  Word  constitutes  the  material  cause 
of  things  ;  this,  as  shown  before,  lies  in  Brahman 
only,  which  is  therefore  more  than  the  Word.  The 
word  of  the  Veda  is  simply  the  expression  of  what  is 
permanent  and  eternal  in  all  things  (universalia  in 
rebus),  and  as  all  individual  things  are  created  in 
accordance  with  it,  they  are  rightly  said  to  have 
their  true  origin  in  the  Veda  and  in  Brahman.  This 
is  afterwards  confirmed  by  passages  from  /Stuti  and 
SmHti,  such  as  BHh.  Ar.  Up.  I,  2,  4  :  '  Then  with 


522  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

his  mind  he  united  himself  with  Speech.'  The  Word 
therefore,  or  Speech,  existed  before  creation,  as  we 
read  in  the  Burnt  i  also,  e.  g.  the  Mahabharata  XII, 
8534:  'He  who  exists  by  himself  let  first  stream 
forth  the  Word,  the  eternal,  without  beginning  or 
end,  the  Divine  Word  which  we  read  in  the  Veda, 
whence  proceeded  the  evolution  of  the  world  ; '  and 
again,  Mahabh.  XII,  8535  :  'God  in  the  beginning 
created  the  names  and  forms  of  things,  and  the 
continuous  process  of  their  works.' 

If  we  read  such  passages  carefully,  it  is  easy  to 
see  that  Veda,  which  is  identified  with  the  words 
of  creation,  or  the  ideas  or  logoi  of  the  world,  was 
meant  for  more  than  what  was  afterwards  called 
the  three  Vedas,  the  Samhitas,  and  Brahma^as. 
Veda  stands  here  for  Logos  or  Sophia,  and  compre- 
hends all  named  concepts,  necessary  for  the  creation 
of  all  created  things. 

In  order  to  show  that  there  is  nothing  strange 
in  this,  $amkara  remarks  that  even  we  ourselves, 
when  we  mean  to  do  anything,  have  first  to  think 
of  the  word  for  what  we  mean  to  do.  In  the  same 
manner  the  words  of  the  Veda  had  to  be  present 
to  the  mind  of  the  Creator,  Pra^apati,  before  he 
could  have  created  the  things  corresponding  to 
them.  And  thus  it  is  said  in  the  Veda  (Taitt.  Br. 
II,  2,  4,  2):  '"This  is  the  earth,"  he  said,  and 
created  the  earth.'  This  will  sound  strange  to 
many  readers,  as,  I  confess,  it  sounded  strange 
to  me  when  I  first  came  across  these  thoughts,  so 
full  of  Neo-platonic  reminiscences,  nay  even  to  such 
().  T.  thought  as  '(Jod  spake,  Let  there  be  light, 
and  there  was  light.'  Of  course,  if  we  can  bring 
ourselves  to  say  that  the  Logos  of  the  Alexandrian 


THOUGHTS  ON  LANGUAGE.  523 

philosophers  had  no  antecedents  in  early  Greek 
philosophy l,  there  would  be  an  end  of  the  whole 
question,  and  we  should  simply  have  to  admit  that 
Brahmans  came  to  Alexandria,  and  indoctrinated 
pagan  and  Christian  philosophers  with  their  ideas 
of  Va&  or  Speech.  But  as  every  Greek  scholar 
knows  that  the  very  opposite  is  the  case,  and  I  have 
tried  to  show  this  on  several  occasions,  the  question 
requires  a  very  different  solution  from  that  pro- 
posed by  Professor  Weber,  if  indeed  it  admits  of 
any.  Why  will  people  not  see  that  it  is  far  more 
scholarlike  to  confess  our  ignorance  than  to  give 
an  answer,  however  hesitatingly,  and  thus  to  dis- 
courage further  research  ? 

Hindu  philosophers  have  treated  this  whole  ques- 
tion with  so  much  care  that  we  can  see  at  least 
that  they  truly  cared  for  it,  and  had  fully  perceived 
its  intimate  connection  with  some  of  the  highest 
problems,  both  religious  and  philosophical,  which 
were  nearest  to  their  heart. 

They  begin  with  the  beginning  and  try  first  to 
make  it  clear  to  themselves  what  /Sabda  is.  $abda 
means  word,  but  it  also  means  sound,  and  they 
therefore  begin  with  asking  what  sound  is.  We  have 
seen  already  that  they  actually  postulated  a  fifth 
element  Akasa,  which  we  translate  by  ether,  and 
which  was  meant  to  be  the  vehicle  of  sound  and 
of  sound  only.  The  existence  of  this  fifth  element 
was  altogether  denied  by  the  materialists,  the 
Barhaspatyas,  because  it  is  supersensible,  but  it  was 
admitted  as  an  independent  element  by  the  other 
schools  of  thought,  even  by  the  Buddhists,  because 


1  See  Anathon  Aall,  Gescluclite  der  Logosidee,  1896,  pp.  218  seq. 


524  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

they  held  that  air  could  not  possibly  be  the  vehicle 
of  sound.  Its  loudness  might  depend  on  it,  but  not 
its  quality.  The  Vaiseshika-philosophy,  for  instance, 
which  takes  a  special  interest  in  the  question  of  the 
elements,  explains  sound  as  the  object  apprehended 
by  the  sense  of  hearing  (II,  2,  21).  It  then  declares 
that  sound  is  neither  substance  nor  action,  but  a 
quality  (cf.  I,  i,  6  com.),  having  Akasa  or  ether  for 
its  substance.  The  opinion  that  sound  exists  always 
and  eternally,  and  is  only  made  manifest  by  each 
speaker,  which  is  held  by  the  Mimamsakas,  is  re- 
jected by  Kanada,  sounds  and  words  being  accepted 
as  momentary  manifestations  only  of  eternal  sound. 
This  is  illustrated  by  the  striking  of  a  drum  with 
a  drumstick,  where  we  can  clearly  see  that  sound  is 
produced  by  a  conjunction  between  a  drum  and  a 
drumstick,  and  that  it  is  only  carried  along  by  the  air. 
All  these  arguments  are  clearly  directed  against 
the  Mima/msakas  who  for  reasons  of  their  own  re- 
quire >Sabda,  whether  sound  or  word,  to  be  eternal. 
It  must  be  said,  however,  to  their  honour  that 
they  allow  full  credit  to  the  Purvapakshin  who 
opposes  the  eternal  character  of  sounds  and  words. 
'  No,'  he  says  *,  '  sound  cannot  be  eternal,  because  we 
see  (i)  that  it  is  a  product,  (2)  that  it  passes  away, 
(3)  that  it  is  made  (the  very  letters  being  called 
A-kara,  Ka-kara  &c.,  A-making,  Ka-making  &c.). 
We  see  (4)  that  it  is  perceived  by  different  persons 
at  once,  (5)  that  it  changes  (as  Dadhi  Atra  changes 
to  Dadhy  Atra),  and  (6)  that  it  is  augmented  by 
the  number  of  those  who  make  it.  But  to  all  these 


1  Cf.  Ballantyne's  Mimawm-Sutras,  p.  8  ;  Muir,  Orig.  Sansk. 
Texts,  III,  pp.  70  seq. 


THOUGHTS  ON  LANGUAGE.  525 

difficulties  the  Mima/msaka  has  a  ready  answer. 
The  word  is  eternal,  he  says,  and  though  the  per- 
ception of  sound  is  the  same  on  both  sides,  we  are 
right  in  looking  on  sound  as  eternal  and  as  always 
present,  only  not  always  manifested  on  account  of 
the  absence  of  an  utterer  or  an  exciter.  The  letter 
k,  now  heard,  is  the  same  which  has  always  been 
heard.  If  it  is  said  that  sound  is  made,  that  only 
means  that  it  is  employed,  and  if  it  is  perceived  at 
the  same  time  by  many,  the  same  applies  to  the 
sun.  As  to  the  modification  of  sound,  it  is  not 
the  same  letter  modified,  but  it  is  another  letter 
in  the  place  of  a  letter,  and  as  to  the  increase  of 
noise,  that  is  due  to  the  increase  of  the  number 
of  conjunctions  and  disjunctions  of  the  air. 

(raimini's  reasons  in  support  of  the  eternal  char- 
acter of  sound  are  that,  though  the  sound  may 
vanish,  it  leaves  its  traces  in  the  mind  of  the 
hearer  or  learner ;  that  it  is  everywhere  at  the 
same  time ;  that,  if  repeated,  it  is  the  same,  and 
that  we  have  110  right  to  suppose  that  it  is  ever 
annihilated.  If  it  should  be  supposed  that  sound 
is  a  mere  modification  of  air,  the  answer  is  that  the 
ear  does  not  simply  hear  the  air,  but  is  sensitive 
only  to  what  is  intangible  in  sound,  the  quality. 
Besides,  there  are  the  definite  words  of  the  Veda 
which  tell  us  of  an  eternal  Voice. 

Having  thus  established  to  his  own  satisfaction 
the  eternity  of  sound,  (raimini  proceeds  to  defend 
the  sounds  or  words  of  the  Veda  against  all  possible 
objections.  These  arguments  were  examined  by  us 
before,  when  the  authorship  of  the  Veda  had  to  be 
discussed,  and  when  it  was  shown  that  the  author 
of  the  Veda  could  not  have  been  a  personal  being, 


526  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

but  that  the  Veda  could  only  have  been  seen  by 
inspired  Rishis  as  revealed  to  them,  not  as  made 
by  them.  We  may  therefore  at  once  proceed  to 
the  next  point,  namely,  to  the  question,  as  to  what 
constitutes  a  word,  and  what  according  to  Indian 
philosophers  is  its  real  character.  Though  these 
discussions  are  of  a  grammatical  rather  than  of 
a  philosophical  character,  they  deserve  our  atten- 
tion, because  they  show  how  keen  an  interest  the 
ancient  philosophers  of  India  had  taken  in  the 
Science  of  Language,  and  how  clearly  they  had 
perceived  the  intimate  relation  between  language 
and  thought,  and  in  consequence  between  the 
Science  of  Language  and  the  Science  of  Thought 
or  Philosophy. 

How  well  the  Hindus  understood  that  the  study 
of  language  forms  an  integral  part  of  philosophy, 
we  may  gather  from  the  fact  that  they  actually 
admitted  Panini,  their  greatest  grammarian,  among 
their  representative  philosophers.  They  had  evi- 
dently perceived  that  language  is  the  only  pheno- 
menal form  of  thought,  and  that,  as  human  beings 
possess  no  means  of  perceiving  the  thoughts  of 
others,  nay  even  their  own  thoughts,  except  in  the 
form  of  words,  it  was  the  duty  of  a  student  of 
thought  to  inquire  into  the  nature  of  words  before 
he  approached  or  analysed  the  nature  of  what  we 
mean  by  thought,  naked  thought,  nay  skinned 
thought,  as  it  has  been  truly  called,  when  divested 
of  its  natural  integuments,  the  words.  They  under- 
stood what  even  modern  philosophers  have  i'ailed  to 
understand,  that  there  is  a  difference  between  Vor- 
steUurifj  (presentation  or  percept)  and  Bcgriff  (con- 
cept), and  that  true  thought  has  to  do  with  conceptual 


SPHOTA.  527 

words  only,  nay  that  the  two,  word  and  thought,  are 
inseparable,  and  perish  when  separated.  M&dhava 
in  his  survey  of  all  philosophies,  assigns  a  place 
between  (7aimini's  Purva  Mim4ms£i  and  Kapila's 
Samkhya  to  the  Panini  Darsana,  what  we  should  call 
the  grammatical  system  of  Pamni.  Other  systems 
also  treat  most  fully  of  linguistic  questions,  as,  for 
instance,  the  Purva-Mimamsa  when  treating  of  the 
question  whether  sound,  the  material  element  of 
words,  is  eternal  or  not. 

Sphofo. 

Hindu  philosophers  have  actually  elaborated  an 
idea  which  does  not  exist  in  any  other  philosophy, 
that  of  Sphofa.  It  is  true  that  in  Pamni's  own 
Sutras  the  word  Spho£a  does  not  occur,  but  the 
name  of  a  grammarian  whom  he  quotes  (VI,  i,  123), 
Spho^ayana,  shows  that  this  peculiar  word  Sphofci 
must  have  existed  before  Pawini's  time.  Derived 
as  it  is  from  SphuZ,  Spho£a  must  have  meant  origin- 
ally what  bursts  forth.  It  has  been  translated  by 
expression,  notion,  concept  or  idea,  but  none  of 
these  renderings  can  be  considered  as  successful. 
It  really  means  the  sound  of  a  word  as  a  whole,  and 
as  conveying  a  meaning,  apart  from  its  component 
letters.  The  subject  has  been  well  treated  by 
Madhava  in  his  Sarva-darsana-sa??igraha.  Here, 
when  examining  the  P4mni  Darsana,  he  shows  first 
of  all  that  the  /Sabda  or  word  which  Pamni  pro- 
fesses to  teach  in  his  $abdcanusasana,  or  grammar, 
is  really  the  same  as  Brahman.  '  The  eternal  word/ 
he  writes,  '  which  is  called  Spho^a,  and  is  without 
parts,  is  the  true  cause  of  the  world/  is  in  fact 
Brahman,  and  he  adds  thereupon  some  lines  from 


528  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Bhartn'hari's  BrahmakawcZa,  where  that  grammarian 
(died  650  A.D.)  says  :— 

'  Brahman,    without    beginning    or    end,    the    in- 
destructible essence  of  language, 

Which    developed    in   the   form    of  things,    and 

whence  springs  the  creation  of  the  world.' 
What   more   could    be    said   of    the    Neo-platonic 
Logos  ? 

In  answer  to  some  who  deny  the  existence  of 
such  a  Sphofa,  it  is  maintained  that  it  is  actually 
an  object  of  perception,  for  all  men,  on  hearing  the 
word  '  cow,'  know  it  as  distinct  from  the  letters 
composing  it.  This  shows,  as  we  knew  already  from 
the  Pratisakhyas,  that  the  Hindus  had  elaborated 
the  idea  of  letters,  nay  even  of  vowels  and  con- 
sonants, long  before  they  became  acquainted  with 
the  written  letters  of  a  Semitic  alphabet,  and  I  only 
wonder  that  those  who  believe  in  an  ancient  indi- 
genous alphabet,  should  never  have  appealed,  though 
vainly,  to  the  discussions  of  Spho^a,  in  support  of 
their  opinion.  And  if  it  were  said  that  cognition 
arises  from  the  separate  letters  of  a  word,  we  ask, 
he  says,  whether  these  letters  are  supposed  to  pro- 
duce cognition  in  their  collective  or  in  their  separate 
form.  It  cannot  be  in  their  collective  form,  because 
each  letter,  as  soon  as  pronounced,  vanishes,  and 
therefore  cannot  form  a  whole  ;  nor  can  it  be  in 
their  separate  form,  because  no  single  letter  has  the 
power  of  producing  cognition  of  the  meaning  of  any 
word.  As  therefore  the  letters,  whether  in  their 
single  or  their  united  form,  cannot  produce  cogni- 
tion, there  must  be  something  else  by  means  of 
which  knowledge  is  produced,  and  that  is  the 
Splio^a,  the  sound,  distinct  from  the  letters  though 


SPHOTA.  529 

revealed  by  them.  He  then  quotes  from  Patan^ali's 
Mahabhashya  :  '  Now  what  is  the  word  Cow  ?  It 
is  that  by  which,  when  pronounced,  there  is  pro- 
duced in  us  the  simultaneous  cognition  of  dewlap, 
tail,  hump,  hoofs,  and  horns.'  Kaiyate,  explains  this 
more  fully  by  saying  :  '  Grammarians  maintain  that 
it  is  the  word,  as  distinct  from  the  letters,  which 
expresses  the  meaning,  since,  if  the  letters  expressed 
it,  there  would  be  no  use  in  pronouncing  the  second 
and  following  ones  (as  the  first  would  already  have 
conveyed  all  that  is  wished).  It  is  therefore  some- 
thing distinct  from  the  single  letters  which  conveys 
the  meaning,  and  that  is  what  we  call  the  Spho£a.' 

The  objector,  however,  is  not  silenced  at  once. 
He,  too,  asks  the  question  whether  this  Spho£a  is 
manifest  or  non-manifest.  If  it  required  no  mani- 
festation, it  would  always  be  there,  but  if  it  requires 
manifestation,  this  could  be  by  its  letters  only,  when 
they  are  pronounced  ;  and  thus  the  same  difficulties 
which  were  pointed  out  before  as  to  the  collective 
or  single  action  of  letters,  would  arise  again.  This 
dilemma  is  put  forward  by  Bha^a  in  his  Mima??isa- 
sloka-varttika :  '  The  grammarian  who  holds  that 
Spho^a  is  manifested  by  the  letters  as  they  are 
severally  pronounced  and  apprehended,  though 
itself  one  and  indivisible,  does  not  thereby  escape 
from  a  single  difficulty.' 

On  this  point  Panini  (I,  4,  14)  seems  to  have 
given  the  right  solution,  by  laying  it  down  as  a 
principle  that  letters  can  never  form  a  word  unless 
they  have  an  affix  at  the  end,  while  the  letters,  as 
they  are  apprehended,  simply  help  to  convey  the 
meaning  by  means  of  a  conventional  association 
(0ecrei).  This  shows  that  the  conventional  character 

M  m 


53°  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  the  relation  between  sound  and  meaning  was 
fully  recognised  in  India,  whether  that  sound  was 
called  $abda  or  Spho^a.  Nor  is  it  enough  that  the 
letters  should  be  the  same,  they  must  also  follow 
each  other  in  the  same  order,  otherwise  Vasa  and 
Sava,  Nava  and  Yana,  &c.,  would  carry  the  same 
meaning,  which  they  do  not. 

All  this  was  meant  to  show  that  the  admission 
of  a  Spho^a  was  unnecessary ;  but  we  now  get  the 
orthodox  answer,  namely,  that  the  admission  of 
Spho^a  is  necessary,  and  that  all  the  objections  are 
no  more  than  a  catching  at  a  straw  by  a  drowning 
person,  because  separate  letters  would  never  be  a 
word,  as  little  as  flowers  without  a  string  would 
be  a  wreath.  And  as  the  letters  cannot  combine, 
being  evanescent  as  soon  as  they  have  been  pro- 
nounced, we  are  asked  to  admit  a  Spho£a,  and  to 
accept  the  first  letters,  as  revealing  the  invisible 
Sphote,  whereas  the  following  letters  serve  only  to 
make  that  Spho^a  more  and  more  manifest  and 
explicit. 

Words  express  the  Summum  Genus. 

After  having  thus  in  his  own  way  established  the 
theory  of  a  Spho^a  for  every  word,  our  philosophical 
grammarian  takes  another  step,  trying  to  prove  that 
the  meaning  of  all  words  is  ultimately  that  summum 
genus  (Satta),  namely  pure  existence,  the  charac- 
teristic of  which  is  consciousness  of  the  supreme 
reality.  And  lest  it  should  be  thought  that  in  that 
case  all  words  would  mean  one  and  the  same  thing, 
namely  Brahman  or  being,  it  is  remarked  that  in 
one  sense  this  is  really  so  ;  but  that,  as  a  crystal 
is  coloured  by  its  surroundings,  Brahman,  when  con- 


WORDS    EXPRESS    THE    SUMMUM    GENUS.  53! 

nected  with  different  things  and  severally  identified 
with  each,  stands  afterwards  for  different  species, 
such  as  cow,  horse,  &c.,  these  being  first  of  all 
'existence'  (Satta)  or  the  highest  genus,  as  found 
in  individuals,  and  then  only  what  they  are  in  this 
phenomenal  world.  In  support  of  this  another 
passage  of  Bhartrihari's  is  quoted:  'Existence  being 
divided,  as  found  in  cows,  &c.,  is  called  this  or  that 
species  by  means  of  its  connection  with  different 
objects,  and  on  it  all  words  depend.  This  they  call 
the  meaning  of  the  stem,  and  the  meaning  of  the 
root.  This  is  existence,  this  is  the  great  Atman 
(or  Brahman),  expressed  by  affixes  such  as  Tva, 
Tal,  &c.,  which  form  abstract  nouns,  such  as  Go-tva, 
cow-hood,  &c.  For  existence,  as  the  summum  genus, 
is  found  in  all  things,  in  cows,  horses,  &c.,  and  there- 
fore all  words,  expressive  of  definite  meanings,  rest 
ultimately  on  the  summum  genus,  existence,  differen- 
tiated by  various  thoughts  or  words,  such  as  cows, 
horses,  &c.,  in  which  it  resides.  If  the  stem-word, 
the  Pratipadika,  expresses  existence,  the  root  ex- 
presses Bhava,  a  state,  or,  as  others  say,  Kriya, 
action.' 

This  will  remind  us  of  many  of  the  speculations 
of  Greek  as  well  as  medieval  logicians  ;  and  it  is 
exactly  what  my  late  friend  Noire  tried  to  establish, 
that  all  words  originally  expressed  action,  to  which 
I  added  the  amendment  that  they  expressed  either 
an  action  or  a  status.  If  this  true  kernel  of  every 
word  is  by  Hindu  philosophers  called  the  Great 
Atman  (Mahan  Atma),  and  Satta,  the  summum 
genus,  we  must  remember  that,  according  to  the 
Vedanta,  Brahman  is  the  true  substance  of  every- 
thing. This  is  stated  again  by  Bhartrihari : — 

M  m  2 


532  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

'  The  true  reality  is  known  under  its  illusory 
forms,  by  words  under  untrue  disguises;  the  true 
reality  is  named  (for  a  time),  like  the  house  of 
Devadatta,  so  called  for  a  vanishing  reason  (that 
is,  only  so  long  as  Devadatta  is  the  possessor  of 
the  house)  ;  but  by  the  word  house,  pure  house- 
hood3  only  is  expressed.' 

Words  Expressive  of  Genera  or  Individuals? 

But  while  the  meaning  of  all  words  is  thus  ad- 
mitted to  be  Brahman,  we  meet  with  two  schools,  the 
one  of  Va^apyayana,  maintaining  that  our  ordinary 
words  mean  a  genus,  the  other,  of  Vyat/i,  who  holds 
that  they  mean  individual  things.  Pamni  holds 
both  views  as  true  in  grammar,  for  in  one  place, 
I,  2,  58,  he  shows  that  'a  Brahman'  may  mean 
many  Brahmans,  as  when  we  say,  that  a  Brahman 
is  to  be  honoured ;  in  another,  I,  2,  64,  he  states 
that  the  plural  Ramas  means  always  Kama,  Rama 
and  Rama,  i.e.  so  many  single  Ramas. 

All  Words  mean  TO  QV. 

The  idea  that  all  words  in  the  end  mean  Brah- 
man, the  one  Supreme  Being,  was  necessitated  by 
the  very  character  of  the  Vedanta-philosophy,  which 
admits  of  no  duality  except  as  the  result  of  nescience. 
Hence  it  is  said  :  The  Supreme  Being  is  the  thing 
denoted  by  all  words,  and  it  is  identical  with  the 
word  ;  but  the  relation  of  the  two,  while  they  are 
ultimately  identical,  varies  as  it  does  in  the  case  of 
the  two  Atmans,  the  Paramatman  and  the  6rivatman, 
the  highest  or  universal,  and  the  living  or  individual 

1  Read  Gnhatvam  instead  of  Grihitam? 


V        if 

ALL    WORDS    MEAN    TO    OV.  533 

soul,  the  difference  between  the  two  being  due  to 
Avidyd  or  temporary  nescience.  As  early  as  the 
Maitrayana  Upanishad  we  meet  with  verses  to  the 
same  effect,  and  of  an  earlier  date  than  itself,  such 
as  (VI,  22),  'Two  Brahmans  have  to  be  meditated 
on,  the  Word  and  the  Non-word,  and  by  the  Word 
alone  is  the  Non-word  revealed.'  In  this  way  the 
grammatical  philosophers  endeavoured  to  prove  that 
grammar  or  exposition  of  words,  as  it  was  called 
by  Pata%ali  ($abdanusasana),  is,  like  every  other 
system  of  philosophy,  '  the  means  of  final  beatitude, 
the  door  of  emancipation,  the  medicine  of  the  diseases 
of  language,  the  purifier  of  all  sciences,  the  science 
of  sciences  ;  it  is  the  first  rung  on  the  ladder  that 
leads  up  to  final  bliss,  and  the  straight  royal  road 
among  all  the  roads  that  lead  to  emancipation.' 

This  may  be  accepted  as  representing  the  views, 
if  not  of  Panini  himself,  at  least  of  his  followers  ;  and 
I  must  say  that  if  his  explanation  of  a  word  as  a 
number  of  letters  ending  in  a  suffix  had  been  ac- 
cepted, there  would  have  been  no  necessity  for  the 
admission  of  a  Spho£a.  It  was  evidently  not  seen 
by  the  inventors  of  this  Spho^a  that  letters  have  no 
independent  existence  at  all,  and  can  be  considered 
only  as  the  result  of  a  scientific  analysis,  and  that 
words  existed  long  before  even  the  idea  of  letters 
had  been  formed.  Letters,  by  themselves,  have  no 
raison  d'etre.  Spho£a  is  in  fact  the  word  before  it 
had  been  analysed  into  letters,  the  breaking  forth 
of  a  whole  and  undivided  utterance,  such  as  Go, 
'  cow,'  conveying  a  meaning  which  does  not  depend 
on  any  single  letter  nor  on  any  combination  of  them. 
Though  from  our  point  of  view  the  idea  of  such 
a  Spho£a  may  seem  unnecessary,  we  cannot  help 


534  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

admiring  the  ingenuity  of  the  ancient  philosophers 
of  India  in  inventing  such  a  term,  and  in  seeing 
difficulties  which  never  attracted  the  attention  of 
European  philosophers.  For  it  is  perfectly  true  that 
the  letters,  as  such,  have  no  reality  and  no  power, 
and  that  every  word  is  something  different  from  its 
letters,  something  undivided  and  indivisible.  In  such 
a  word  as  Va&,  Vox,  we  have  not  a  combination  of 
three  letters  v,  a,  k,  which  would  be  nothing,  but  we 
have  an  indivisible  explosion,  expressive  of  its  mean- 
ing in  its  undivided  form  only,  and  this  may  be  raised 
to  the  status  of  a  word  by  means  of  a  grammatical 
suffix  which,  as  we  should  say,  makes  an  organised 
whole  of  it.  All  this  is  true  and  recognised  now  by 
all  students  of  the  Science  of  Language,  though  never 
even  suspected  by  the  philosophers  of  other  countries. 
Still  more  important  is  the  idea  that  all  words 
originally  meant  Brahman  or  TO  6V,  and  receive  their 
•special  meaning  from  their  relation  to  the  genera  or 
logoi  in  the  mind  of  Brahman,  as  creative  types. 
Words  are  not  names  of  individuals,  but  always  of 
classes  or  genera,  and  as  genera  they  are  eternal. 
These  logoi  existed  before  the  creation  of  the  world, 
nay,  rendered  that  creation  possible.  This  is  the 
much-despised  Neo-platonic  philosophy,  the  basis  of 
the  Christian  theory  of  creation;  and  that  we  should 
find  it  so  fully  elaborated  in  the  ancient  world  of 
India  is  surely  a  surprise,  and,  I  should  add,  a  wel- 
come surprise.  And  can  we  suppose  that  ideas  which, 
in  Greece,  required  so  many  evolutions  of  thought 
till  they  reached  the  point  which  they  reached  in 
Alexandria,  and  afterwards  in  Palestine,  should  have 
sprung  up  in  India  suddenly  or,  as  it  were,  casually  ? 
Do  we  not  rather  see  clearly  here  also  how  long  and 


V       it 

ALL    WORDS    MEAN    TO    OV.  535 

how  continuous  a  development  of  thought  must 
have  taken  place  south  of  the  Himalayas  before  such 
fruits  could  have  ripened  ?  Would  any  Greek 
scholar  dare  to  say  that  all  this  was  borrowed  from 
Greece  ?  Would  any  Sanskrit  scholar  be  so  intrepid 
as  to  hint  that  the  Greeks  might  possibly  have 
learnt  their  Logos  from  the  Vedic  V&k  ?  Even  if  we 
do  not  accept  the  last  results  of  this  Indian  line  of 
thought,  which  ended  where  Greek  philosophy  ended, 
and  where  Christian  philosophy  began,  nay  even  if 
we  should  put  aside  as  unintelligible  the  beginning 
words  of  the  fourth  Gospel,  '  In  the  beginning  was 
the  Word,'  we  can  at  least  admire  the  struggle  which 
led  up  to  this  view  of  the  world,  and  tried  to  establish 
the  truth  that  there  is  a  Logos,  thought,  that  there 
is  Rhyme  and  Reason  in  the  world,  and  that  the 
whole  universe  is  full  of  Brahman,  the  Eternal  and 
the  Divine,  not  visible  to  the  human  eye,  though 
visible  to  the  human  mind.  That  mind,  according 
to  Indian  philosophy,  has  its  true  being  in  the 
Divine  Mind,  in  which  it  lives  and  moves,  in  which 
alone  it  has  its  true  Self  or  Atman,  which  Atman  is 
Brahman.  To  have  mounted  to  such  heights,  even 
if  we  have  to  descend  again  frightened  and  giddy, 
must  have  strengthened  the  muscles  of  human 
reason,  and  will  remain  in  our  memory  as  a  sight 
never  to  be  forgotten,  even  in  the  lower  spheres  in 
which  we  have  to  move  in  our  daily  life  and  amidst 
our  daily  duties.  Speaking  for  myself,  I  am  bound 
to  say  that  I  have  felt  an  acquaintance  with  the 
general  spirit  of  Indian  philosophy  as  a  blessing 
from  my  very  youth,  being  strengthened  by  it  against 
all  the  antinomies  of  being  and  thinking,  and  nerved 
in  .all  the  encounters  with  the  scepticism  and  ma- 


536  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

terialism  of  our  own  ephemeral  philosophy.  It  is 
easy,  no  doubt,  to  discover  blemishes  in  the  form 
and  style  of  Indian  philosophy,  I  mean  chiefly  the 
Vedanta,  and  to  cite  expressions  which  at  first  sight 
seem  absurd.  But  there  are  such  blemishes  and 
such  absurdities  in  all  philosophies,  even  in  the  most 
modern.  Many  people  have  smiled  at  the  Platonic 
ideas,  at  the  atoms  of  Democritus,  or  at  the  location 
of  the  soul  in  the  pineal  gland  or  in  certain  parts  of 
the  brain ;  yet  all  this  belongs  to  the  history  of 
philosophy,  and  had  its  right  place  in  it  at  the  right 
time.  What  the  historian  of  philosophy  has  to  do 
is  first  of  all  to  try  to  understand  the  thoughts  of 
great  philosophers,  then  to  winnow  what  is  per- 
manent from  what  is  temporary,  and  to  discover,  if 
possible,  the  vein  of  gold  that  runs  through  the  quartz, 
to  keep  the  gold,  and  to  sweep  away  the  rubbish. 
Why  not  do  the  same  for  Indian  philosophy  ?  Why 
not  try  to  bring  it  near  to  us,  however  far  removed 
from  it  we  may  seem  at  first  sight.  In  all  other 
countries  philosophy  has  railed  at  religion  and  re- 
ligion has  railed  at  philosophy.  In  India  alone  the 
two  have  always  worked  together  harmoniously, 
religion  deriving  its  freedom  from  philosophy,  philo- 
sophy gaining  its  spirituality  from  religion.  Is  not 
that  something  to  make  us  think,  and  to  remind  us 
of  the  often-repeated  words  of  Terence,  Humani 
nihil  a  me  alienum  puto  ?  A  rich  kernel  is  often 
covered  by  a  rough  skin,  and  true  wisdom  may  be 
hiding  where  we  least  expect  it. 

Vedanta  on  Sphote. 

We  have  now  to  see  what  the  other  systems  of 
philosophy  have  to  say  on  this  subject,  for  it  is  quite 


VEDANTA    ON    SPHOTA.  537 

clear  that  the  idea  of  a  Spho^a,  though  known  to 
them,  was  not  accepted  by  all.  $amkara,  as  repre- 
senting the  Vedanta-philosophy,  is  entirely  opposed 
to  the  admission  of  a  Spho£a.  He  fully  admits  that 
earth  and  all  the  rest  were  created  according  to  the 
words  earth,  &c.,  which  were  present  to  the  mind  of 
the  Creator,  but  he  asks,  how  were  these  words 
present  ?  Beginning  as  usual  with  the  Purva- 
pakshin  l  or  opponent,  he  produces  as  arguments  in 
favour  of  the  admission  of  a  Spho£a,  that  the  letters 
cannot  convey  the  meaning,  because  as  soon  as  they 
are  pronounced  they  perish,  because  they  differ  ac- 
cording to  the  pronunciation  of  each  speaker,  because 
they  possess  neither  singly  nor  collectively  any 
significative  power,  because  not  even  the  last  letter 
with  the  impression  left  by  the  preceding  letter  in 
our  memory,  would  convey  to  us  the  sense  of  a  word. 
Hence  something  different  from  the  letters  must  be 
admitted,  the  Sphotfa,  the  outburst  of  the  whole 
word,  presenting  itself  all  at  once  as  the  object  of 
our  mental  act  of  apprehension.  That  Spho£a  is 
what  is  eternal,  different  therefore  from  perishable 
and  changeable  letters,  and  it  is  that  Spho^a  from 
which  whatever  is  denoted  by  it  was  produced  in 
creation,  and  which  in  conversation  conveys  to 
others  what  is  in  our  own  mind,  but  always  clothed 
in  sound. 

/Samkara  himself,  however,  considers  such  an 
admission  of  a  Spho£a  entirely  unnecessary,  and, 
in  order  to  prove  this,  he  goes  back  and  calls  to 


1  Ved.  Sutras  I,  3,  28.  This  is  one  of  the  cases  where  the 
Purvapaksha,  the  opponent's  view,  has  been  mistaken  for  5am- 
kara's  own  final  opinion,  or  for  the  Siddhanta. 


538  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

his  aid  an  old  Vedantist,  Upavarsha,  whom  he 
refers  to  elsewhere  also  (III,  3,  53)1.  This  Upa- 
varsha argues  that  the  letters  by  themselves  con- 
stitute the  word,  because  though  they  perish  as 
fast  as  they  are  pronounced,  they  are  always 
recognised  again  as  the  same  letters,  not  only  as 
belonging  to  the  same  class,  but  as  actually  the 
same.  Thus  when  the  word  cow  is  pronounced 
twice,  we  do  not  think  that  two  words  have  been 
pronounced,  but  that  the  same  word  has  been 
pronounced  twice.  And  though  two  individuals 
may,  no  doubt,  pronounce  the  same  word  differently, 
such  differences  are  due  to  the  organs  of  pro- 
nunciation, and  not  to  the  intrinsic  nature  of  the 
letters.  He  holds  that  the  apprehension  of  difference 
depends  on  external  factors,  but  that  their  recog- 
nition is  due  only  to  the  intrinsic  nature  of  the 
letters.  The  sound  which  enters  the  ear  (Dhvani) 
may  be  different,  strong  or  weak,  high  or  low,  but 
the  letters  through  all  this  are  recognised  as  the 
same.  And  if  it  be  said  that  the  letters  of  a  word, 
being  several,  cannot  form  the  object  of  one  mental 
act,  this  is  not  so,  because  the  ideas  which  we  have 
of  a  row,  or  a  wood,  or  an  army,  show  that  things 
which  comprise  several  unities  can  become  objects 
of  one  and  the  same  act  of  cognition.  And  if  it 
be  asked  why  groups  of  letters  such  as  Pika  and 
Kapi  should  convey  different  meanings,  viz.  cuckoo 
and  ape,  we  have  only  to  look  at  a  number  of  ants, 
which  as  long  as  they  move  one  after  another  in 


1  Here  £amkara  charges  Sabarasvamin,  the  famous  commen- 
tator on  the  Purva-Mimamsa,  I,  i,  5,  with  having  borrowed  an 
argument  from  Badaraya/za. 


YOGA    AND    SAMKHYA    ON    SPHOTA.  539 

a  certain  order,  convey  the  idea  of  a  row,  but  cease 
to  do  so  if  they  are  scattered  about  at  random. 

Without  adducing  further  arguments,  *Samkara 
in  the  end  maintains  that  the  admission  of  a  Spho£a 
is  unnecessary,  and  that  it  is  simpler  to  accept 
the  letters  of  a  word  as  having  entered  into  a 
permanent  connection  with  a  definite  sense,  and  as 
always  presenting  themselves  in  a  definite  order  to 
our  understanding,  which,  after  apprehending  the 
several  letters,  finally  comprehends  the  entire 
aggregate  as  conveying  a  definite  sense.  We  never 
perceive  a  Spho£a,  he  argues,  and  if  the  letters 
are  supposed  to  manifest  the  Spho£a,  the  Spho£a 
in  turn  would  have  to  manifest  the  sense.  It  would 
even  be  preferable  to  admit  that  letters  form  a 
genus,  and  as  such  are  eternal,  but  in  either  case 
we  should  gain  nothing  by  the  Spho£a  that  we 
could  not  have  without  it,  by  the  admission  of 
eternal  words  from  which  all  non-eternal  things, 
such  as  gods,  cows,  and  horses,  originated.  Hence 
we  see  that,  though  the  theory  of  the  Spho^a  is 
rejected  by  the  Vedanta,  the  eternal  character  of 
the  words  is  strenuously  retained,  being  considered 
essential,  as  it  would  seem,  in  order  to  maintain 
the  identity  of  Brahman  and  the  Word,  and  the 
creation  of  the  world  by  Brahman  in  accordance 
with  the  eternal  words. 

Yoga  and  Sawkhya  on  Sphofa. 

The  Yoga-philosophy  accepted  the  theory  of  the 
Spho£a,  nay  it  has  been  supposed  to  have  first 
originated  it1,  for,  according  to  the  commentary, 

1  Garbe,  Samkhya-Philosophie,  p.  1 1 1  n. 


54°  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

it  was  against  the  Yoga-philosophers,  rather  than 
against  the  Mimarasa,  that  Kapila's  objections  con- 
cerning the  Spho£a  were  directed.  What  Kapila 
says  about  Sphote,  is  of  much  the  same  character 
as  what  he  had  said  about  Isvara,  the  Lord,  namely 
that  its  existence  cannot  be  proved,  not  that  it  does 
not  exist.  If  Spho£a,  he  says,  is  meant  for  the  group 
of  letters  forming  a  word,  then  why  not  be  satisfied 
with  this,  and  simply  speak  of  a  word  (Pada),  as 
manifesting  its  sense  ?  Why  invent  something 
which  has  never  been  perceived,  and  which  exists 
as  little  apart  from  the  letters  as  a  forest  exists 
apart  from  the  trees,  what  is  in  fact  entirely 
gratuitous  (V,  57). 

Nor  are  the  letters,  from  Kapila's  point  of  view, 
eternal  (V,  58),  because,  as  Badarayana  also  re- 
marked, we  can  witness  their  production ;  and  our 
being  able  to  recognise  them  as  the  same,  proves 
no  more  than  their  belonging  to  one  and  the  same 
genus,  but  not  their  being  eternal. 

It  is  curious  to  observe  the  elaborateness  with 
which  what  seems  to  us  a  purely  grammatical  ques- 
tion is  discussed  in  the  various  schools  of  Indian 
philosophy.  The  Spho£a,  however,  is  to  Indian 
thinkers  not  merely  a  grammatical  problem  ;  it  is 
distantly  connected  with  the  question  of  the  eternity 
of  the  Veda.  This  eternity  is  denied  by  Kapila 
(Sa??ikhya  V,  46)  because  the  Vedas  speak  of  them- 
selves as  having  been  produced  in  such  passages  as  : 
'  He  became  heated,  and  from  him,  thus  heated,  the 
three  Vedas  were  produced.'  Eternity  of  the  Veda 
can  therefore,  according  to  Kapila,  mean  no  more 
than  an  unbeginning  and  unbroken  continuity, 
so  that  even  at  the  beginning  of  a  new  creation 


YOGA    AND    SAJlfKHYA    ON    SPHO^A.  54! 

the  order  of  words  in  the  Veda  remains  the  same 
as  before.  But  if,  as  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  main- 
tain, this  Veda  was  the  work  of  a  personal  being, 
such  as  tsvara,  this  is  declared  impossible  by  Kapila, 
because,  as  he  holds,  such  an  Isvara  has  never  been 
proved  to  exist.  For  he  holds  that  the  Lord  or 
Isvara  could  only  have  been  either  a  liberated  or  an 
unliberated  Purusha.  Now  a  liberated  Purusha,  such 
as  Vislmu  for  instance,  could  not  have  composed 
this  enormous  Veda,  because  he  is  free  from  all 
desires,  nor  could  an  active,  non-liberated  Purusha 
have  been  the  author,  because  he  would  not  have 
possessed  the  omniscience  required  for  such  a  work. 
But  we  must  not  conclude  that,  because  we  know 
of  no  possible  personal  author,  therefore  the  Veda 
is  eternal,  in  the  same  way  as  germs  and  sprouts. 
What  is  called  the  wTork  of  a  personal  being  always 
presupposes  a  corporeal  person,  and  it  presupposes 
a  will.  We  should  not  call  the  mere  breathing  of 
a  person  in  sleep,  a  personal  work.  But  the  Vedas, 
as  we  read,  rise  spontaneously  like  an  exhala- 
tion from  the  Highest  Being,  not  by  any  effort 
of  will,  but  by  some  miraculous  virtue.  It  must 
not  be  supposed  that  the  words  of  the  Veda  are 
manifested,  like  the  notes  of  birds,  without  any 
purpose  or  meaning.  No,  they  are  the  means  of 
right  knowledge,  and  their  innate  power  is  proved 
by  the  wonderful  effects  which  are  produced,  for 
instance,  by  medical  formulas  taken  from  the 
Ayur-veda.  This  is  the  same  argument  which  was 
used  in  the  Nyaya-Sutras  II,  68,  as  a  tangible 
and  irrefutable  proof  of  the  efficiency  of  the  Vedas. 
Here  all  would  depend  on  the  experimental  proof, 
and  this  the  Hindus,  ancient  or  modern,  would  find 


542  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

it   difficult   to    supply ;    but    if   the    Hindus   were 
satisfied,  we  have  no  reason  to  find  fault. 


Nyaya  on  Sphola. 

If  now  we  turn  to  the  Nyaya-philosophy  we  find 
that  Gotama  also  denies  the  eternity  of  sound, 
because,  it  is  argued,  we  can  see  that  it  has  a 
beginning  or  cause,  because  it  is  an  object  of  sense- 
perception,  and  because  it  is  known  to  be  factitious. 
Besides,  if  sound  were  eternal,  we  should  be  able 
to  perceive  it  always,  even  before  it  is  uttered, 
there  being  no  known  barrier  between  the  ether 
and  our  ear  (II,  3,  86).  This  ethereal  substratum 
of  sound  is,  no  doubt,  intangible  (II,  3,  104),  but 
it  is  nevertheless  a  something  perceptible  by  one 
of  our  senses,  that  of  hearing,  and  hence  it  must 
be  non-eternal.  The  true  eternity  of  the  Vedas 
consists,  according  to  Gotama,  in  the  unbroken 
continuity  of  their  tradition,  study,  and  employment, 
both  in  the  Manvantaras  and  Yugas  which  are  past 
and  those  that  are  still  to  come,  whilst  their  au- 
thority depends  on  the  authority  of  the  most 
competent  persons.  This  is  the  same  with  secular 
words  '.  This  last  admission  would  of  course  be 
strongly  resisted  and  resented  by  Vedanta  philo- 
sophers, but  it  si iows  at  all  events  the  freedom 
with  which  all  Indian  philosophers  were  allowed  to 
handle  the  ancient  Sacred  Books  of  the  country. 


1  Vatsyayana's    Commentary    on    the    Nyaya,    p.    91,    ed. 
Biblioth.  Indica,  Muir,  0.  S.  T..  Ill,  p.  115. 


VAISESHIKA    ON    SPHOTA.  543 

Vaiseshika  on  Spho/a. 

The  Vaiseshikas  lastly  do  not  differ  much  from 
the  Naiyayikas  as  to  whether  the  Veda  is  eternal 
or  not,  is  authoritative  or  not,  but  they  follow  their 
own  way  of  reasoning.  The  very  last  Sutra  of  the 
Vaiseshika-Sastra,  X,  2, 9,  says:  '  It  has  been  declared 
that  authoritativeness  belongs  to  the  Amnaya  (Veda) 
because  it  is  uttered  by  Him ' ;  and  this  declaration 
is  found  likewise  in  the  third  Sutra  of  the  first  book 
to  which  the  final  Sutra  refers.  But  though  this 
Sutra  is  given  twice,  there  attaches  some  uncertainty 
to  its  meaning,  because,  as  pointed  out  by  the  native 
commentators,  the  words  '  because  uttered  by  Him,' 
may  also  be  translated  by  '  because  it  declare's  it,' 
i.  e.  '  because  it  teaches  duty  (Dharma).'  But  in 
either  case  there  are  objections,  the  same  as  those 
with  which  we  are  familiar  from  the  Purvapa.ksha 
in  the  Vedanta  and  Mimamsaka-Sutras,  such  as 
self-contradictoriness,  tautology,  and  the  rest  dis- 
covered by  some  critics  in  the  text  of  the  Vedas. 
Thereupon  the  eternal  character,  too,  of  the  Veda  is 
called  in  question,  and  whoever  its  author  may  have 
been,  whether  human  or  divine,  it  is  doubted  whether 
he  can  justly  claim  any  authority. 

In  answer  to  this  sweeping  condemnation  the  Vaise- 
shika  points  out  VI,  i ,  i ,  '  that  at  all  events  there  is 
in  the  Veda  a  construction  of  sentences  consequent 
upon  intelligence/  or  as  we  should  say,  the  Veda 
must  at  least  be  admitted  to  be  the  work  of  a  rational 
author,  and  not  of  an  author  of  limited  intelligence, 
because  no  merely  rational  author  could  propound 
such  a  rule  as  '  He  who  desires  paradise,  should 
sacrifice.'  Such  matters  could  not  be  known  in  their 


544  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

causes  and  effects  to  men  of  limited  knowledge  like 
ourselves.  Whatever  we  may  think  of  this  argu- 
ment, it  shows  at  all  events  the  state  of  mind  of  the 
earliest  defenders  of  revelation.  They  argued  that, 
because  the  author  must  at  least  be  admitted  to 
have  been  a  rational  being,  he  could  not  possibly 
have  declared  things  that  are  beyond  the  knowledge 
of  ordinary  rational  beings,  such  as  the  rewards 
of  sacrifices  in  another  world,  and  other  matters 
beyond  the  ken  of  experience.  The  Vaiseshikas 
admitted  a  personal  author  of  the  Veda,  an  Isvara, 
but  this  by  no  means  involved  the  eternity  of  the 
Veda.  With  the  Vaiseshikas,  also,  the  eternity  of 
the  Veda  meant  no  more  than  its  uninterrupted 
tradition  (Sampradaya),  but  some  further  supports 
to  its  authority  were  found  in  the  fact  that,  besides 
being  the  work  of  a  rational  being,  in  this  case  of 
Isvara,  the  Lord,  it  had  been  accepted  as  the  highest 
authority  by  a  long  line  of  the  great  or  greatest  men 
who  themselves  might  safely  be  regarded,  if  not  as 
infallible,  at  least  as  trustworthy  and  authoritative. 

Prameyas,  Objects  of  Knowledge. 

If  now,  after  an  examination  of  the  various  opinions 
entertained  by  the  Nyaya  and  other  Hindu  philo- 
sophers of  the  significative  power  of  words,  we 
return  to  the  Sutras  of  Gotama,  we  find  that,  in  his 
third  book,  he  is  chiefly  concerned  with  the  Prameyas, 
that  is,  the  objects  of  knowledge,  as  established  by 
the  Pramanas  ;  and  the  first  question  that  meets  us 
is  whether  the  senses  or  Indriyas,  the  instruments 
of  objective  knowledge,  should  be  treated  as  different 
from  the  Atman,  the  ISelf,  or  not. 


SARIRA,    BODY.  545 

Indriyas,  Senses. 

Gotama  holds  that  they  are  different  from  the 
Atman ;  and  in  order  to  prove  this,  he  argues,  that 
if  each  sense  could  perceive  by  itself,  each  sense 
would  perceive  its  own  object  only,  the  ear  sound, 
the  eye  colour,  the  skin  warmth,  &c.  ;  and  that 
therefore  what  perceives  all  these  impressions  to- 
gether, at  the  same  time  and  in  the  same  object, 
must  be  something  different  from  the  several  senses, 
namely  the  Atman,  or,  according  to  other  systems, 
the  Manas  or  mind. 

/Sarira,  Body. 

Next  follows  the  question  whether  the  body  is 
the  same  as  the  Atman,  a  question  which  would 
never  occur  to  a  Vedantist.  But  Gotama  asks  it 
and  solves  it  in  his  own  way.  It  cannot  be,  he  says, 
because,  when  the  body  has  once  been  destroyed  by 
being  burnt,  the  consequences  of  good  and  evil  deeds 
would  cease  to  pursue  the  Self  through  an  endless 
series  of  births  and  rebirths.  A  number  of  similar 
objections  and  answers  follow,  all  showing  how  much 
this  question  had  occupied  the  thoughts  of  the 
Nyaya  philosophers.  Some  of  them  suggest  difficul- 
ties which  betray  a  very  low  state  of  philosophical 
reasoning,  while  other  difficulties  are  such  that  even 
in  our  own  time  they  have  not  ceased  to  perplex 
minute  philosophers.  We  meet  with  the  question 
why,  with  the  dual  organ  of  vision,  there  is  no 
duality  of  perception  ;  why,  if  memory  is  supposed 
to  be  a  quality  or  mode  of  the  Self,  mere  remembrance 
of  an  acid  substance  can  make  our  mouth  water. 
After  these  questions  have  been,  if  not  solved,  at 
least  carefully  considered,  Gotama  goes  on  to  show 

N  n 


546  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

that  if  the  body  be  not  Atman,  neither  can  Manas, 
mind,  be  conceived  as  the  Atman. 

Manas,  Mind. 

The  Self  is  the  knower,  while  the  mind  or  Manas 
is  only  the  instrument  (Kara?ia)  of  knowledge  by 
which  attention  is  fixed  on  one  thing  at  a  time. 
The  Self  is  eternal,  not  of  this  life  only,  without 
beginning  and  therefore  without  end.  And  here  a 
curious  argument  is  brought  in,  different  from  the 
usual  Indian  arguments  in  support  of  our  previous 
existence,  to  show  that  our  Self  does  not  begin 
with  our  birth  on  earth,  because,  as  he  says,  the 
smile  of  a  new-born  child  can  only  arise  from  memory 
of  a  previous  experience.  While  our  modern  psycho- 
physiologists  would  probably  see  in  the  smiles  or 
the  cries  of  a  new-born  child  a  reflex  action  of  the 
muscles,  our  Indian  objector  declares  that  such 
movements  are  to  be  considered  as  no  more  than 
the  opening  and  closing  of  a  lotus-flower.  And 
when  this  view  has  been  silenced  by  the  remark 
that  a  child  does  not  consist  of  the  five  elements 
only,  is  not  in  fact,  as  we  should  say,  a  mere 
vegetable,  a  new  argument  of  the  same  character 
is  adduced,  namely  the  child's  readiness  to  suck, 
which  can  only  be  accounted  for,  they  say,  by  the 
child  having,  in  a  former  life,  acquired  a  desire  for 
milk.  When  this  again  has  been  rejected  as  no 
argument,  because  we  see  that  iron  also  moves 
towards  a  magnet,  Gotama  answers  once  more  that 
a  child  cannot  be  treated  like  a  piece  of  iron.  And 
when,  as  a  last  resource,  desire  in  general,  as  mani- 
fested by  a  child,  is  appealed  to  as  showing  a  child's 
previous  existence,  arid  when  this  also  has  once 


MANAS,    MIND.  547 

more  been  answered  by  the  remark  that  a  child, 
like  every  other  substance,  must  be  possessed  of 
qualities,  Gotama  finally  dismisses  all  these  objectors 
by  maintaining  that  desires  are  not  simply  qualities, 
but  can  arise  from  experience  and  previous  im- 
pressions (Samkalpa)  only. 

The  consideration  of  the  body  and  of  the  sub- 
stances of  which  it  consists,  whether  of  earth  only, 
or  of  three  elements,  earth,  water  and  fire,  or  of 
four,  earth,  water,  fire  and  air,  or  of  five,  because  it 
displays  the  qualities  of  the  five,  is  naturally  of  small 
interest  in  our  time.  The  final  solution  only  deserves 
our  attention,  in  so  far  as  it  clearly  shows  that  the 
Nyaya  also  recognised  in  some  cases  the  authority 
of  the  Veda  as  supreme,  by  stating  that  the  body 
is  made  of  earth,  and  why  ?  '  /Srutiprama^yat,' 
*  because  scripture  says  so/ 

What  follows,  the  discussion  of  sight  or  of  the 
visual  ray  proceeding  from  the  eye,  and  the  question 
whether  we  possess  one  general  sense  only,  or  many, 
may  contain  curious  suggestions  for  the  psycho- 
physiologist;  but  there  is  little  of  what  we  mean 
by  really  philosophic  matter  in  it.  The  qualities 
assigned  to  the  objects  of  perception  are  not  very 
different  from  what  they  are  supposed  to  be  in  the 
other  systems  of  philosophy,  and  they  may  be  passed 
by  here  all  the  more  because  they  will  have  to  be 
considered  more  fully  when  we  come  to  examine  the 
VaLs'eshika  system. 

More  interesting  is  the  discussion  which  occupies 
the  rest  of  the  third  book.  It  is  chiefly  concerned 
with  the  nature  of  Self  (Atman),  the  mind  (Manas), 
the  difference  between  the  two,  and  their  relation 
to  knowledge.  Here  we  should  remember  that, 

N  n  2 


548  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

according  to  I,  15,  Buddhi  (understanding),  Upa- 
labdhi  (apprehension),  and  6rn4na  (knowledge)  are 
used  synonymously.  Though  there  are  many  mani- 
festations of  Manas,  such  as  memory,  inference,  verbal 
testimony,  doubt,  imagination,  dreaming,  cognition, 
guessing,  feeling  of  pleasure,  desire,  and  all  the  rest, 
yet  its  distinguishing  feature,  we  are  told,  is  what  we 
should  call  attention,  or  as  Gotama  explains  it  (1, 16), 
'  the  preventing  of  knowledge  arising  altogether.' 
This  is  declared  to  be  due  to  attention,  and  in  many 
cases  this  would  be  the  best  rendering  of  Manas. 
Manas  is  therefore  often  called  the  doorkeeper, 
preventing  sensations  from  rushing  in  promiscuously 
and  all  at  once.  If  therefore  we  translate  Manas 
by  mind,  we  must  always  remember  its  technical 
meaning  in  Indian  philosophy,  and  its  being  originally 
different  from  Buddhi,  understanding,  which  might 
often  be  rendered  by  light  or  the  internal  light  that 
changes  dark  and  dull  impressions  into  clear  and 
bright  sensations,  perceptions,  and  knowledge  in 
general,  or  by  understanding,  at  least  so  far  as  it 
enables  us  to  transform  and  understand  the  dull 
impressions  of  the  senses. 

The  difference  between  the  philosophical  nomen- 
clatures in  English  and  Sanskrit  for  the  Manas  and 
its  various  functions  is  so  great  that  a  translation 
is  almost  impossible,  and  I  am  by  no  means  satisfied 
with  my  own.  It  should  also  be  remembered  that 
the  same  Sanskrit  term  has  often  very  different 
meanings  in  different  systems  of  philosophy. 

The  Buddhi  of  the  Nyaya  philosophers,  for  instance, 
is  totally  different  from  the  Buddhi  of  the  Sa7?<khyas. 
Their  Buddhi  is  eternal,  while  the  Buddhi  of 
Gotama  is  distinctly  declared  to  be  non-eternal. 


MEMORY.  549 

The  Buddhi  of  the  Sarakhya  is  a  cosmic  principle 
independent  of  the  Self,  and  meant  to  account  for  the 
existence  of  the  light  of  reason  in  the  whole  universe ; 
while  in  the  Nyaya-philosophy  it  signifies  the  sub- 
jective activity  of  thought  in  the  acquisition  of 
knowledge,  or  in  the  lighting  up  and  appropriating 
of  the  inert  impressions  received  by  the  senses. 
This  knowledge  can  come  to  an  end  and  vanish 
by  forgetfulness,  while  an  eternal  essence,  like  the 
Buddhi  of  the  Samkhyas,  though  it  may  be  ignored, 
can  never  be  destroyed. 

Atman. 

In  answering  the  question,  What  is  knowledge, 
Gotama  declares  in  this  place  quite  clearly  that  real 
knowledge  belongs  to  the  Atman  only,  the  Self  or 
the  soul.  It  cannot  belong  to  the  senses  and  their 
objects  (Indriyartha),  because  knowledge  abides  even 
when  the  senses  and  what  they  perceive  have  been 
suppressed.  Nor  does  knowledge  belong  to  the 
Manas,  which  is  but  the  instrument  of  knowledge, 
but  it  arises  from  the  conjunction  of  Atman  (Self) 
with  Manas  (attention),  and  on  the  other  side  of 
Manas  with  Indriyas  (senses).  Manas  is  the  instru- 
ment, and  the  wielder  of  that  instrument,  like  the 
wielder  of  an  axe,  must  be  some  one  different  from 
it ;  this,  according  to  the  Nyaya,  can  only  be  the  Self 
who  in  the  end  knows,  who  remembers,  who  feels 
pain  and  pleasure,  who  desires  and  acts. 

Memory. 

Memory,  Snm'ti,  has  not  received  from  Indian 
philosophers  the  attention  which  it  deserves.  If  it 
is  treated  as  a  means  of  knowledge,  it  falls  under 
Anubhava,  which  is  either  immediate  or  mediate, 


550  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  then  called  Smn'ti.  Every  Amibhava  is  sup- 
posed to  leave  an  impression  or  modification  of  the 
mind,  which  is  capable  of  being  revived.  There  is 
another  manifestation  of  memory  in  the  act  of  re- 
membering or  recognising,  as  when  on  seeing  a  man 
we  say,  This  is  he,  or  This  is  Devadatta.  Here  we 
have  Anubhava,  knowledge  of  this,  joined  with  some- 
thing else,  namely  he  or  Devadatta,  a  revived 
Samskara,  impression,  or  Smriti.  The  subject  of 
memory  is  more  fully  treated  in  III,  113,  and  the 
various  associations  which  awaken  memory  are 
enumerated  as  follows  :— 

1.  Attention  to  an  object  perceived  ; 

2.  Connection,  as  when  the  word  Prama/ia,  proof, 
recalls  Prameya,  what  has  to  be  proved ; 

3.  Repetition,  as  when  one  has  learned  a  number 
of  things  together,  one  calls  up  the  other  ; 

4.  A  sign,  as  when  a  thing  recalls  its  sine  qud 
'iion ; 

5.  A  mark,  as  when  a  standard  reminds  one  of  its 
bearer ; 

6.  Likeness,  as  when  one  body  recalls  a  similar 
body; 

7.  Possession,  as  when  a  property  reminds  us  of 
its  owner ; 

8.  Belonging,  as  when  royal  attendants  remind  us 
of  the  king  ; 

9.  Relation,  as  when  a  disciple  reminds  us  of  the 
teacher,  or  kine  of  a  bull ; 

10.  Succession,  as  when  the  pounding  of  rice  re- 
minds one  of  sprinkling  ; 

1 1.  Absence,  as  of  a  wife  ; 

12.  Fellow-workers,  as  when  one  disciple  reminds 
us  of  the  co-disciples  ; 


MEMOKY.  551 

1 3.  Opposition,  as  when  the  ichneumon  recalls  the 
snake  ; 

14.  Pre-eminence,  as  when  investiture  with  the 
sacred  string  recalls  the  principal  agent,  the  Guru 
or  teacher  ; 

15.  Receiving,  as  when  a  gift  reminds  one  of  the 
giver ; 

1 6.  Covering,  as  when  a  sword  reminds  one  of  the 
sheath  ; 

1 7.  Pleasure  and  pain,  each  of  which  recalls  the 
occasioner  of  it ; 

1 8.  Desire  and  aversion,   reminding  us  of  their 
causes ; 

19.  Fear,  reminding  us  of  what  is  feared,  such  as 
death  ; 

20.  Want,  which  makes  us  think  of  those  who  can 
supply  our  wants  ; 

2 1 .  Motion,  as  when  a  shaking  branch  reminds  us 
of  the  wind  ; 

22.  Affection,  reminding  us  of  a  son,  &c.  ; 

23.  Merit  and  Demerit,  which  make  us  reflect  on 
joys  and  sorrows  of  a  former  life- 
Such  lists  are  very  characteristic  of  Hindu  philo- 
sophy, and  they  show  at  the  same  time  that  it  is  a 
mistake  to  ascribe  them  exclusively  to  the  Samkhya- 
philosophy.     Though  they  do  not  add  much  to  our 
knowledge   of  the    fundamental   tenets    of    Indian 
philosophy,  they  show  once  more  how  much  thought 
had  been  spent  in  the  elaboration  of  mere  details  ; 
and  this,  as  we  are  told  in  this  case  by  the  commen- 
tator himself,  chiefly  in  order  to  stir  up  the  thoughts 
of  the  learners,  *Sishyavyutpadanaya,  to  independent 
activity. 


552  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Knowledge  not  Eternal. 

The  important  point,  however,  which  Gotama 
wishes  to  establish  is  this,  that  knowledge,  though 
belonging  to  the  eternal  Self,  is  not  in  itself  eternal, 
but  vanishes  like  any  other  act.  He  also  guards 
against  the  supposition  that  as  we  seem  to  take  in 
more  than  one  sensation  at  the  same  time,  as  in 
eating  a  cake  full  of  different  kinds  of  sweets,  we 
ought  to  admit  more  than  one  Manas ;  and  he  ex- 
plains that  this  simultaneousness  of  perception  is 
apparent  only,  just  as  the  fiery  circle  is  when  we 
whirl  a  firebrand  with  great  rapidity,  or  as  we 
imagine  that  a  number  of  palm-leaves  are  pierced 
by  a  pin  at  one  blow,  and  not  in  succession,  one  after 
the  other.  Lastly,  he  states  that  the  Manas  is  Ami, 
infinitely  small,  or,  as  we  should  say,  ari  atom. 

More  Prameyas. 

While  the  third  book  was  occupied  with  the  first 
six  of  the  Prameyas,  or  objects  to  be  known  and 
proved,  including  the  whole  apparatus  of  knowledge, 
such  as  Atman,  Self  or  soul,  Indriyas,  senses,  Manas, 
mind,  central  sensorium,  Buddhi,  understanding,  and 
/Sarira,  body,  and  therefore  gave  rise  to  some  im- 
portant questions  not  only  of  metaphysics,  but  of 
psychology  also,  the  fourth  book  which  is  devoted 
to  the  remaining  six  Prameyas,  such  as  (7)  Pravritti 
(activity),  (8)Dosha  (faults),  (9)  Pretyabh&va  (trans- 
migration), (10)  Phala  (rewards),  ( i  i)  DuAkha  (pain), 
and  (12)  Apavarga  (final  beatitude),  is  naturally  of  a 
more  practical  character,  and  less  attractive  to  the 
student  of  the  problems  of  being  and  thinking. 
Some  questions,  however,  are  treated  in  it  which 


EXISTENCE    OF    DEITY.  553 

cannot  well  be  passed  over,  if  we  wish  to  give  a  full 
insight  into  the  whole  character,  and  the  practical 
bearing  of  the  Nyaya-philosophy. 

Though  this  philosophy  is  supposed  to  represent 
Indian  logic  only,  we  have  already  seen  enough  of 
it  to  know  that  it  included  almost  every  question 
within  the  sphere  of  philosophy  and  religion,  and 
that  its  chief  object  was  the  same  as  that  of  all 
the  other  systems  of  Indian  philosophy,  namely 
salvation. 

Life  after  Death. 

One  of  the  seven  interesting  subjects  treated 
here  is  Pretyabhava,  literally  existence  after  having 
departed  this  life,  and  this  is  proved  in  a  very  short 
way.  As  the  Self  has  been  proved  to  be  eternal, 
Gotama  says  (IV,  10)  it  follows  that  it  will  exist 
after  what  is  called  death.  Some  of  the  objections 
made  to  this  tenet  are  easily  disposed  of,  but  nothing 
is  said  to  establish  what  is  meant  by  transmigration, 
that  is  being  born  again  in  another  world  as  either 
a  human  or  as  some  other  animal  being,  or  even 
as  a  plant. 

Existence  of  Deity. 

Another  important  subject,  if  it  is  not  passed 
over  altogether,  is  treated  by  Gotama,  as  it  was  by 
Kapila,  incidentally  only,  I  mean  the  existence  of  a 
Deity.  It  comes  in  when  a  problem  of  the  Buddhists 
is  under  discussion,  namely,  whether  the  world  came 
out  of  nothing,  and  whether  the  manifestation  of 
anything  presupposes  the  destruction  of  its  cause. 
This  is  illustrated  by  the  fact  that  the  seed  has  to 
perish  before  the  flower  can  appear.  But  Gotama 
strongly  denies  this,  and  reminds  the  opponent  that 


554  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

if  the  seed  were  really  destroyed  by  being  pounded 
or  burnt,  the  flower  would  never  appear.  Nor  could 
it  be  said  that  the  flower,  if  it  had  not  existed  pre- 
viously, destroyed  the  seed,  while,  if  it  had,  it  would 
have  owed  its  existence  to  the  simple  destruction  of 
the  seed.  Therefore,  he  continues,  as  nothing  can 
be  produced  from  nothing,  nor  from  an  annihilated 
something,  like  a  seed,  the  world  also  cannot  have 
sprung  from  nothingness,  but  requires  the  admission 
of  an  Isvara,  the  Lord,  as  its  real  cause.  And  this 
admission  of  an  Isvara,  even  though  in  the  capacity 
of  a  governor  rather  than  of  a  maker  of  the  world, 
is  confirmed  by  what  was  evidently  considered  by 
Gotama  as  a  firmly  established  truth,  namely,  that 
every  act  of  man  invariably  produces  its  result, 
though  not  by  itself,  but  under  the  superintendence 
of  some  one,  that  is,  of  Lsvara. '  We  then  meet  with 
a  new  argument,  different  from  that  of  the  Mimam- 
sakas,  namely  that,  if  work  done  continued  to  work 
entirely  by  itself,  the  fact  that  some  good  or  evil  deeds 
of  men  do  riot  seem  to  receive  their  reward  would 
remain  unaccounted  for.  This  is  certainly  a  curious 
way  of  proving  the  existence  of  God  by  the  very  argu- 
ment which  has  generally  been  employed  by  those 
who  want  to  prove  His  non-existence.  Gotama's 
real  object,  however,  is  to  refute  the  Buddhist  theory 
of  vacuity  (6'unya),  or  of  Nothing  being  the  cause  of 
the  world,  and  afterwards  to  disprove  the  idea  that 
effects  can  ever  be  fortuitous.  And  as  Gotama 
differs  from  Gautama  in  denying  the  origin  of  the 
world  out  of  nothing,  he  also  differs  from  the  Sawkhya 
philosophers,  who  hold  that  all  tilings,  as  developed 
out  of  Prakriti,  are  real  only  so  long  as  they  are 
noticed  by  the  Purusha.  He  holds,  on  the  contrary, 


CAUSE    AND    EFFECT.  555 

that  some  things  are  real  and  eternal,  but  others  are 
not,  because  we  actually  see  both  their  production 
and  their  destruction.  If  we  were  to  doubt  this,  we 
should  doubt  what  has  been  settled  by  the  authority 
of  all  men,  and  there  would  be  an  end  of  all  truth 
and  untruth.  This l  is  a  novel  kind  of  argument  for 
an  Indian  philosopher  to  use,  and  shows  that  with 
all  the  boldness  of  their  speculations  they  were  not 
so  entirely  different  from  ourselves,  and  not  entirely 
indifferent  to  the  Securus  judicat  orbis  terrarum. 

Cause  and  Effect. 

If,  however,  we  call  the  Nyaya-philosophy  theistic, 
we  should  always  remember  that  such  terms  as 
theistic  and  atheistic  are  hardly  applicable  to  Indian 
philosophy  in  the  sense  in  which  they  are  used 
by  Christian  theologians.  With  us  atheistic  implies 
the  denial  of  a  supreme  and  absolute  Being ;  but 
we  saw  that  even  the  so-called  atheism  of  the 
Samkhya-philosophy  does  not  amount  to  that.  It 
is  simply  the  denial  of  an  Isvara,  as  an  active  and 
personal  creator  and  ruler  of  the  world. 

And  even  such  a  personal  God  is  not  altogether 
denied  by  the  Samkhyas  ;  they  only  deny  that  He  can 
be  proved  to  exist  by  human  arguments,  and  if  He 
exists  as  such,  they  hold  that  in  the  eyes  of  philo- 
sophers He  would  be  but  a  phenomenal  manifesta- 
tion of  the  Godhead,  liable  to  change,  liable  even 
to  temporary  disappearance  at  the  end  of  each  aeon, 
and  to  reappearance  at  the  beginning  of  a  new 
aeon.  It  is  this  kind  of  a  divine  being,  a  personal 
Isvara  or  Lord,  that  is  taken  for  granted  by  the 

J  Sarvalaukikapramatva. 


556  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Nyaya  philosophers,  and,  it  may  be  added  at  once, 
by  the  Vaiseshika  philosophers  also  l. 

In  the  Tarka-Samgraha,  for  instance,  it  is  distinctly 
stated  that  'the  Atman  or  Self  is  twofold,  the 
(rivatman  (personal  Self),  and  the  Paramatman 
(the  Highest  Self).'  It  must  not  be  supposed, 
however,  that  Lsvara,  the  omniscient  Lord,  is  Param- 
atman, which  is  one  only,  while  the  (rivatman  is 
separate  for  each  individual  body,  all-pervading  and 
eternal.  Though  Paramatman  is  Isvara,  Isvara  is 
not  Paramatman,  but  a  phenomenal  manifestation 
of  Paramatman  only.  The  argument  which  we  met 
with  before  is  fully  stated  in  Gotama's  Sutras, 
IV,  19-21.  The  actions  of  men,  it  is  said,  do  not 
always  produce  an  effect.  Good  actions  do  not 
always  produce  good  results,  nor  bad  actions  bad 
results,  as  they  ought,  if  every  act  continued  to 
act  (Karman).  Hence  there  must  be  another  power 
that  modifies  the  continuous  acting  of  acts,  and  that 
can  be  Isvara  only.  It  is  not  denied  thereby 
that  human  actions  are  required,  and  that  no  effects 
would  take  place  without  the  working  of  human 
agents,  only  they  are  not  the  sole  cause  of  what 
happens,  but  we  require  another  power,  an  Lsvara, 
to  account  for  what  would  otherwise  be  irrational 
results  of  human  actions. 

Phala,  Rewards. 

We  now  come  to  the  tenth  of  the  Prameyas, 
Phala  ;  and  here  the  same  subject  is  treated  once 
more,  though  from  a  different  point  of  view.  It  is 


1  Bullantyne,  Christianity  contrasted  with  Hindu  Philosophy, 
p.  12  ;  Muir,  0.  S.  T.,  vol.  iii,  p.  133. 


EMANCIPATION.  557 

asked,  how  are  effects,  rewards  or  punishments,  pos- 
sible in  another  life  ?  As  both  good  and  evil  works 
are  done  in  this  life,  the  cause,  namely  these  works, 
would  have  ceased  to  exist  long  before  their  fruit 
is  to  be  gathered.  This  objection  is  met  by  an 
illustration  taken  from  a  tree  which  bears  fruit 
long  after  it  has  ceased  to  be  watered.  The  ob- 
jector is  not,  however,  satisfied  with  this,  but,  on 
the  contrary,  takes  a  bolder  step,  and  denies  that 
any  effect  either  is  or  is  not,  or  is  or  is  not,  at  the 
same  time.  Gotama  is  not  to  be  frightened  by 
this  apparently  Buddhistic  argument,  but  appeals 
again  to  what  we  should  call  the  common-sense  view 
of  the  matter,  namely,  that  we  actually  see  pro- 
duction and  destruction  before  our  very  eyes.  We 
can  see  every  day  that  a  cloth,  before  it  has  been 
woven,  does  not  exist,  for  no  weaver  would  say  that 
the  threads  are  the  cloth,  or  the  cloth  the  threads. 
And  if  it  should  be  argued  that  the  fruit  produced 
by  a  tree  is  different  from  the  fruit  of  our  acts, 
because  there  is  no  receptacle  (Asraya)  or,  as  we 
should  say,  no  subject,  this  is  met  by  the  declara- 
tion that,  in  the  case  of  good  or  bad  acts,  there  is 
a  permanent  receptacle,  namely  the  Self,  which 
alone  is  capable  of  perceiving  pain  or  joy  in  this 
or  in  any  other  state  of  existence. 

Emancipation. 

After  examining  the  meaning  of  pain,  arid  ex- 
pressing his  conviction  that  everything,  even  plea- 
sure, is  full  of  pain,  Gotama  at  last  approaches  the 
last  subject,  emancipation  (Apavarga).  He  begins 
as  usual  with  objections,  such  as  that  it  is  impossible 
in  this  life  to  pay  all  our  moral  debts,  that  certain 


558  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

sacrificial  duties  are  enjoined  as  incumbent  on  us 
to  the  end  of  our  lives,  and  that  if  it  is  said  that 
a  man  is  freed  from  these  by  old  age,  this  does  not 
imply  that,  even  when  he  is  no  longer  able  to  per- 
form his  daily  duties,  he  should  not  perform  certain 
duties,  if  in  thought  only.  If,  therefore,  good  works 
continue,  there  will  be  rewards  for  them,  in  fact  there 
will  be  paradise,  though  even  this  would  really  have 
to  be  looked  upon  as  an  obstacle  to  real  emancipa- 
tion. Nothing  remains  but -a  complete  extinction 
of  all  desires,  and  this  can  be  effected  by  knowledge 
of  the  truth  only.  Therefore  knowledge  of  the  truth 
or  removal  of  all  false  notions,  is  the  beginning  and 
end  of  all  philosophy,  and  of  the  Nyaya-philosophy  in 
particular.  The  first  step  towards  this  is  the  cessa- 
tion of  Ahamkara,  here  used  in  the  sense  of  personal 
feelings,  such  as  desire  for  a  beautiful  and  aversion 
to  a  deformed  object.  Desire  therefore  has  to  be 
eradicated  and  aversion  also  ;  but  before  he  explains 
how  this  desire,  which  arises  from  false  apprehension 
(Mithyagtfiana)  can  be  eradicated,  Gotama  is  carried 
back  once  more  to  a  subject  which  had  been  dis- 
cussed before,  namely  whether  the  objects  of  desire 
exist  as  wholes  or  as  parts.  And  this  leads  him  on 
to  what  is  the  distinguishing  doctrine  both  of  the 
Nyaya  and  of  the  Vaiseshika-philosophies,  namely 
the  admission  of  Anus  or  atoms.  If  wholes  are 
constantly  divided  and  subdivided,  we  should  in 
the  end  be  landed  in  nihilism,  but  this  is  not  to  be. 
There  cannot  be  annihilation  because  the  A?ius  or 
the  smallest  parts  are  realities  (IV,  8-82),  and, 
according  to  their  very  nature,  cannot  be  further 
reduced  or  compressed  out  of  being.  Against  this 
view  of  the  existence  of  what  we  should  call 


KNOWLEDGE    OF    IDEAS,    NOT    OF    THINGS.          559 

atoms,  the  usual  arguments  are  then  adduced, 
namely  that  ether  (or  space)  is  everywhere,  and 
therefore  in  an  atom  also,  and  if  an  atom  has  figure 
or  a  without  and  a  within,  it  is  of  necessity 
divisible.  In  reply,  ether  is  said  to  be  intangible, 
neither  resistant  nor  obstructing,  that  is,  neither 
occupying  space  against  others,  nor  preventing 
others  from  occupying  space ;  and  in  the  end  an 
appeal  is  made  to  a  recognised  maxim  of  Hindu 
philosophy,  that  there,  must  never  be  a  regressio 
in  infinitum,  as  there  would  be  in  attempting  to 
divide  an  atom. 

Knowledge  of  Ideas,  not  of  Things. 

And  now  the  opponent,  again,  it  would  seem, 
a  Buddhist,  makes  a  still  bolder  sweep  by  denying 
the  existence  of  any  external  things.  All  we  have 
is  knowledge,  he  says,  not  things  ;  nothing  different 
from  our  knowledge,  or  independent  of  our  know- 
ledge, can  exist  for  us.  Gotama  objects  to  this 
(Vidyamatra)  doctrine,  first  of  all  because,  if  it  were 
impossible  to  prove  the  existence  of  any  external 
things,  it  would  be  equally  impossible  to  prove 
their  non-existence.  And  if  an  appeal  were  made 
to  dreams,  or  visions  produced  by  a  mirage,  or  by 
jugglery,  it  should  be  remembered  that  dreams  also, 
like  remembrances,  presuppose  previous  perception 
of  things ;  and  that  even  in  mistaking  we  mistake 
something,  so  that  false  knowledge  can  always  be 
removed  by  true  knowledge.  After  granting  that, 
one  more  question  arises,  how  that  true  knowledge. 
if  once  gained,  is  to  be  preserved,  because  we  saw 
that  knowledge  is  not  eternal,  but  vanishes.  And 
here  the  Nyaya  suddenly  calls  the  Yoga  to  its  aid, 


560  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

and  teaches  that  Samadhi  or  intense  meditation 
will  prove  a  safe  preservative  of  knowledge,  in  spite 
of  all  disturbances  from  without,  while  the  Nyaya- 
philosophy  retains  its  own  peculiar  usefulness  as 
employed  in  the  defence  of  truth  against  all  comers, 
in  which  case  even  such  arts  as  wrangling  and 
cavilling  may  prove  of  service. 

This  may  seem  a  very  humble  view  to  take  with 
regard  to  a  system  of  philosophy  which  at  the  very 
outset  promised  to  its  students  final  beatitude  as  the 
highest  reward.  But  considering  the  activity  of  philo- 
sophical speculation,  of  which  we  have  had  so  many 
indications  in  the  ancient  as  well  as  in  the  modern 
history  of  India,  we  can  well  understand  that  philo- 
sophers, skilled  in  all  the  arts  and  artifices  of  reason- 
ing, would  secure  for  their  system  that  high  position 
which  the  Nyaya  certainly  held  and  still  holds ' 
among  the  recognised  systems  of  orthodox  philo- 
sophy. It  would  be  useless  to  go  once  more  over 
the  topics  from  £ati,  futility,  No.  XIV,  to  No.  XVI, 
Nigrahasthana,  objectionable  proceedings,  which  are 
fully  treated  in  the  fifth  book. 

Syllogism. 

There  is  one  subject,  however,  which  requires  some 
more  special  consideration,  namely  the  Syllogism, 
or  the  Five  Members,  treated  as  VII.  This  has 
always  excited  the  special  interest  of  European 
logicians  on  account  of  certain  startling  similarities 
which  no  doubt  exist  between  it  and  the  syllogism  of 
Aristotle  and  the  schoolman.  But  from  a  Hindu 
point  of  view  this  syllogism  or  even  logic  in  general 

1  Cowell,  Report  on  the  Toles  of  Nuddea,  1867. 


SYLLOGISM.  561 

is  by  no  means  the  chief  object  of  the  Nyaya-philo- 
sophy,  nor  is  it  its  exclusive  property.  It  has  been 
fully  discussed  in  the  Vedanta  and  Samkhya  systems, 
and  once  more  in  the  Vaiseshika ;  but  as  it  forms 
the  pride  of  the  Nyaya,  it  will  find  its  most  appro- 
priate place  here  l. 

As  we  saw  colour  mentioned  as  the  distinguishing 
quality  of  light,  we  found  knowledge  put  forward  as 
the  characteristic  feature  of  Self.  The  Nyaya  looks 
upon  knowledge  as  inseparably  connected  with  the 
Self,  though  in  the  larger  sense  of  being  the  cause 
of  every  conception  that  has  found  expression  in 
language.  Knowledge,  according  to  the  Nyaya,  is 
either  perception  or  remembrance.  Perception 
again  is  twofold,  right  or  wrong.  Right  perception 
represents  a  thing  such  as  it  is,  silver  as  silver. 
This  is  called  truth,  Prama.  Wrong  perception 
represents  a  thing  as  it  is  not,  mother-of-pearl  as 
silver. 

This  right  perception,  according  to  the  Nyaya- 
philosophy  is,  as  we  saw,  of  four  kinds,  sensuous, 
inferential,  comparative,  and  authoritative,  and  is 
produced  by  perception,  by  inference,  by  com- 
parison, and  by  revealed  authority.  Here  we  are 
brought  back  to  the  Prama/was  again  which  were 
discussed  in  the  beginning,  but  among  which  one, 
Anumana  or  inference,  receives  here  a  more  special 
treatment.  We  are  thus  obliged,  in  following 
the  Sutras,  to  go  over  some  of  the  ground  again. 
Different  systems  of  philosophy  differed,  as  we  saw, 


1  See  M.  M.,  Appendix  to  Archbishop  Thomson's  Laws  of 
Thought ;  also  Die  Theorie  des  indischen  Rationalisten  von 
den  Erkenntnissmitteln,  von  R.  Garbe,  1888. 

O  O 


562  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

in  the  number  of  Prainanas  which  they  admit,  ac- 
cording to  what  each  considers  the  only  trust- 
worthy channels  of  knowledge. 

Pramanas  in  different  Philosophical  Schools. 

One,  Perception  :  AUrvakas. 

Two,  Perception  and  inference  :  Vaiseshikas  and 
Buddhists. 

Three,  Perception,  inference,  arid  word  (revela- 
tion) :  Sa?>ikhyas. 

Four,  Perception,  inference,  revelation,  and  com- 
parison :  Naiyayikas. 

Five,  Perception,  inference,  revelation,  comparison, 
and  presumption  :  Prabhakara  (a  Mimamsaka). 

Six,  Perception,  inference,  revelation,  comparison, 
presumption,  and  not-being  :  Mlmamsakas. 

Others  admit  also  Aitihya,  tradition,  Sambhava, 
equivalence,  AeshZa,  gesture. 

After  sensuous  knowledge,  which  takes  cognisance 
of  substances,  qualities,  and  actions,  has  been 
examined,  the  question  arises,  how  can  we  know 
things  which  are  not  brought  to  us  by  the  senses  ? 
How  do  we  know,  for  instance,  that  there  is  fire  which 
we  cannot  see  in  a  mountain,  or  that  a  mountain 
is  a  volcano,  when  all  that  we  do  see  is  merely 
that  the  mountain  smokes  ?  We  should  remember 
that  there  were  three  kinds  of  Anumana  (Nyaya- 
Sutras  II,  37)  called  Purva vat,  having  the  sign  before, 
or  as  the  cause,  $eshavat,  having  the  sign  after  or  as 
the  effect,  and  S4manyatodri'shZa,  keen  together.  In 
the  first  class  the  sign  of  past  rain  was  the  swelling 
of  rivers  ;  in  the  second  the  sign  of  coming  rain  was 
the  ants  carrying  off  their  eggs  ;  in  the  third  the 
sign  of  the  motion  of  the  sun  was  its  being  seen 


PRAMAJVAS  IN  DIFFERENT  PHILOSOPHICAL  SCHOOLS.  563 

in  different  places.  Knowledge  of  things  unseen, 
acquired  in  these  three  ways,  is  called  inferential 
knowledge  (Anumana),  and  in  order  to  arrive  at  it, 
we  are  told  that  we  must  be  in  possession  of  what  is 
called  a  Vyapti.  This,  as  we  saw,  was  the  most  im- 
portant word  in  an  Indian  syllogism.  Literally  it 
means  pervasion.  Vyapta  means  pervaded  ;  Vyapya, 
what  must  be  pervaded ;  Vyapaka,  what  pervades. 
This  expression,  to  pervade,  is  used  by  logicians  in 
the  sense  of  invariable,  inseparable  or  universal  con- 
comitance. Thus  sea-water  is  always  pervaded  by 
saltness,  it  is  inseparable  from  it,  and  in  this  sense 
Vyapya,  what  is  to  be  pervaded,  came  to  be  used  for 
what  we  should  call  the  middle  term  in  a  syllogism. 
Vyapti,  or  invariable  concomitance,  may  sometimes  be 
taken  as  a  general  rule,  or  even  as  a  general  law,  in 
some  cases  it  is  simply  the  sine  qud  non.  It  is  such 
a  Vyapti,  for  instance,  that  smoke  is  pervaded  by 
or  invariably  connected  with  fire,  or,  as  the  Hindus 
say,  that  smokiness  is  pervaded  by  fieriness,  not, 
however,  fieriness  by  smokiness.  We  arrive  by 
induction  at  the  Vyapti  that  wherever  there  is 
smoke,  there  is  fire,  but  not  that  wherever  there  is 
fire,  there  is  smoke.  The  latter  Vyapti  in  order  to 
be  true  would  require  a  condition  or  Upadhi,  viz. 
that  the  firewood  should  be  moist.  If  we  once  are 
in  possession  of  a  true  Vyapti  as  smokiness  being 
pervaded  by  fieriness,  we  only  require  what  is  called 
groping  or  consideration  (Paramarsa)  in  order  to 
make  the  smoke,  which  we  see  rising  from  the 
mountain,  a  Paksha  or  member  of  our  Vyapti,  such 
as  '  wherever  there  is  smoke,  there  is  fire.'  The 
conclusion  then  follows  that  this  mountain  which 
shows  smoke,  must  have  fire. 

002 


564  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

All  this  may  sound  very  clumsy  to  European 
logicians,  but  it  would  have  been  easy  enough  to 
translate  it  into  our  own  more  technical  language. 
We  might  easily  clothe  Ka?iada  in  a  Grecian  garb 
and  make  him  look  almost  like  Aristotle.  Instead 
of  saying  that  inferential  knowledge  arises  from 
discovering  in  an  object  something  which  is  always 
pervaded  by  something  else,  and  that  the  pervading 
predicate  is  predicable  of  all  things  of  which  the 
pervaded  predicate  is,  we  might  have  said  that  our 
knowledge  that  S  is  P  arises  from  discovering  that 
S  is  M,  and  M  is  P,  or  with  Aristotle,  6  o-yAXoytoyioy 
Sia  TOV  fj.€crov  rb  axpov  rS>  rpiTcp  Seixvvo'ii'.  Wliat 
Kanada  calls  one  member  of  the  pervasion,  Paksha, 
e.  g.  the  smoking  mountain,  might  have  been  trans- 
lated by  subject  or  terminus  minor  ;  what  pervades, 
Vyapaka  or  Sadhya,  e.  g.  fieriness,  by  predicate  or 
terminus  major ;  and  what  is  to  be  pervaded, 
Vyapya,  i.  e.  smokiness,  by  terminus  medius.  But 
what  should  we  have  gained  by  this  ?  All  that  is 
peculiar  to  Indian  logic  would  have  evaporated,  and 
the  remainder  might  have  been  taken  for  a  clumsy 
imitation  of  Aristotle.  Multa  jiunt  eadem,  sed 
aliter,  and  it  is  this  very  thing,  this  aliter,  that 
constitutes  the  principal  charm  of  a  comparative 
study  of  philosophy.  Even  such  terms  as  syllogism 
or  conclusion  are  inconvenient  here,  because  they 
have  with  us  an  historical  colouring  and  may  throw 
a  false  light  on  the  subject.  The  Sanskrit  Anumana 
is  not  exactly  the  Greek  o-u/zTrepacr/za,  but  it  means 
measuring  something  by  means  of  something  else. 
This  is  done  by  what  we  may  call  syllogism,  but 
what  the  Hindus  describe  as  Paramarsa  or  groping 
or  trying  to  find  in  an  object  something  which  can 


ANUMANA    FOR    OTHERS.  565 

be  measured  by  something  else  or  what  can  become 
the  member  of  a  pervasion.  This  corresponds  in  fact 
to  the  looking  for  a  terminus  medius.  In  Kapila's 
system  (I,  61)  the  principal  object  of  inference  is 
said  to  be  transcendent  truth,  that  is,  truth  which 
transcends  the  horizon  of  our  senses.  Things  which 
cannot  be  seen  with  our  eyes,  are  known  by  in- 
ference, as  fire  is,  when  what  is  seen  is  smoke  only. 
Gotama  therefore  defines  the  result  of  inference 
(I,  JQI)  as  knowledge  of  the  connected,  that  is,  as 
arising  from  the  perception  of  a  connection  or  a  law. 
But,  again,  the  relation  of  what  pervades  and  what 
is  pervaded  is  very  different  from  what  we  should 
call  the  relative  extension  of  two  concepts.  This 
will  become  more  evident  as  we  proceed.  For  the 
present  we  must  remember  that  in  the  case  before 
us  the  act  of  proving  by  means  of  Anumana  con- 
sists in  our  knowing  that  there  is  in  the  mountain 
something  always  pervaded  by,  or  inseparable  from 
something  else,  in  our  case,  smoke  always  pervaded 
by  fire,  and  that  therefore  the  mountain,  if  it  smokes, 
has  fire. 

By  this  process  we  arrive  at  Anumiti,  the  result 
of  Anumana,  or  inferential  knowledge,  that  the 
mountain  is  a  volcano.  So  much  for  the  inference 
for  ourselves.  Next  follows  the  inference  for 
others. 

Anumana  for  Others. 

What  follows  is  taken  from  Annambha^a's  Com- 
pendium. '  The  act  of  concluding,'  he  says,  '  is 
twofold,  it  being  intended  either  for  one's  own 
benefit  or  for  the  benefit  of  others.  The  former  is 
the  means  of  arriving  at  knowledge  for  oneself,  and 
the  process  is  this.  By  repeated  observation,  as  in 


566  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  case  of  kitchen  hearths  and  the  like,  we  are 
reminded  of  a  rule  (Vyapti),  such  as  that  wherever 
we  have  seen  smoke,  we  have  seen  fire.  We  now 
approach  a  mountain  and  wonder  whether  there 
may  or  may  not  be  fire  in  it.  We  see  the  smoke,  we 
remember  the  rule,  and  immediately  perceive  that 
the  mountain  itself  is  fiery.  This  is  the  process 
when  we  reason  for  ourselves. 

But  if  we  have  to  convince  somebody  else  of  what 
we,  by  inference,  know  to  be  true,  the  case  is 
different.  We  then  start  with  the  assertion,  The 
mountain  is  fiery.  We  are  asked,  Why?  and  we 
answer,  Because  it  smokes.  We  then  give  our 
reason,  or  the  major  premiss,  that  all  that  smokes 
is  fiery,  as  you  may  see,  for  instance,  on  a  kitchen 
hearth  and  the  like.  Now  you  perceive  that  the 
mountain  does  smoke,  and  hence  you  will  admit 
that  T  was  right  when  I  said  that  the  mountain  is 
fiery.  This  is  called  the  five-membered  form  of 
exposition,  and  the  five  members  are  severally 
called  l, — 

(1)  Assertion  (Prati^fta),  the  mountain  has  fire  ; 

(2)  Reason  (Hetu  2),  because  it  has  smoke  ; 

(3)  Instance  (Udaharana  or  Nidarsana),  look  at 
the    kitchen    hearth,    and    remember    the    Vyapti 
between  smoke  and  fire  ; 

(4)  Application  (Upanaya),  and  the  mountain  has 
smoke  ; 

(5)  Conclusion  (Nigamana),  therefore  it  has  fire3.' 


1  Nyaya-Sutras  I,  32. 

2  Synonyms   of   Hetu  are  Apadesa,   Liwga,   Prainawa,   and 
Karawa.     Vaiseshika-Sutras  IX,  2,  4. 

3  The  Vaiseshika  terms  are   (i)  Prati^na,   (2)  Apadesa,   (3) 
Nidarsana,  (4)  Anusamdhana,  (5)  Pratyamnaya. 


ANUMANA    FOR    OTHERS.  567 

In  both  cases  the  process  of  inference  is  the  same, 
but  the  second  is  supposed  to  be  more  rhetorical, 
more  persuasive,  and  therefore  more  useful  in  con- 
troversy. 

What  is  called  by  Annambha^a  the  conclusion 
for  oneself,  corresponds  totidem  verbis  to  the  first 
form  of  Aristotle's  syllogism  : — 

All  that  smokes  is  fiery, 
The  mountain  smokes  ; 
Therefore  the  mountain  is  fiery. 

We  must  not  forget,  however,  that  whatever 
there  is  of  formal  Logic  in  these  short  extracts,  has 
but  one  object  with  Gotama,  that  of  describing 
knowledge  as  one  of  the  qualities  of  the  Self,  and 
as  this  knowledge  is  not  confined  to  sensuous 
perceptions,  Gotama  felt  it  incumbent  on  him  to 
explain  the  nature  and  prove  the  legitimacy  of  the 
inferential  kind  of  knowledge  also.  It  is  not  so 
much  logic  as  it  is  noetic  that  interested  Kamida. 
He  was  clearly  aware  of  the  inseparability  of  induc- 
tive and  deductive  reasoning.  The  formal  logician, 
from  the  time  of  Aristotle  to  our  own,  takes  a 
purely  technical  interest  in  the  machinery  of  the 
human  mind,  he  collects,  he  arranges  and  analyses 
the  functions  of  our  reasoning  faculties,  as  they  fall 
under  his  observation.  But  the  question  which 
occupies  Gotama  is,  How  it  is  that  we  know  any 
thing  which  we  do  not,  nay  which  we  cannot 
perceive  by  our  senses,  in  fact,  how  we  can  justify 
inferential  knowledge.  From  this  point  of  view  we 
can  easily  see  that  neither  induction  nor  deduction, 
if  taken  by  itself,  \vould  be  sufficient  for  him. 
Deductive  reasoning  may  in  itself  be  most  useful 
for  forming  Vyaptis,  it  may  give  a  variety  of 


568  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

different  aspects  to  our  knowledge,  but  it  can  never 
add  to  it.  And  if  on  one  side  Gotama  cannot  use 
deduction,  because  it  teaches  nothing  new,  he  cannot 
on  the  other  rely  entirely  on  induction,  because  it 
cannot  teach  anything  certain  or  unconditional. 

The  only  object  of  all  knowledge,  according  to 
Gotama,  is  absolute  truth  or  Prama.     He  knew  as 
well  as  Aristotle  that  tirayayri  in  order  to  prove  the 
oAo>y  must  be  Sia  TrdvTtov,  and  that  this  is  impossible. 
Knowledge  gained  by  epagogic  reasoning  is,  strictly 
speaking,  always  e?n  TO  77-6X1;,  and  not  what  Gotama 
would  call  Prama.   The  conclusion,  f.  i.,  at  which  Aris- 
totle arrives  by  way  of  induction,  that  animals  with 
little  bile  are  long-lived,  might  be  called  a  Vyapti. 
He  arrives  at  it  by  saying  that  man,  horse,  and  mule 
(C)  are  long-lived  (A)  ;    man,  horse,  and  mule  (C) 
have   little   bile   (B) ;    therefore    all    animals   with 
little  bile  are  long-lived.     Gotama  does  not  differ 
much  from  this,  but  he  would  express  himself  in 
a  different  way.     He  would  say,  wherever  we  see 
the  attribute  of  little  bile,  we  also  see  the  attribute 
of  long  life,  as  for  instance  in  men,  horses,  mules,  &c. 
But  there  he  would  not  stop.     He  would  value  this 
Vyapti  merely  as  a  means  of  establishing  a  new 
rule  ;  he  would  use  it  as  a  means  of  deduction  and 
say,  'Now  we  know  that  the  elephant  has  little  bile, 
therefore  we  know  also  that  he  is  long-lived.'     Or 
to  use  another  instance,  where  Aristotle  says  that 
all  men  are  mortal,  Ka?^ada  would  say  that  humanity 
is  pervaded  by  mortality,  or  that  we  have  never  seen 
humanity  without  mortality  ;  and  where  Aristotle 
concludes  that  kings  are  mortal  because  they  belong 
to  the  class  of  men,  Gotama,  if  he  argued  for  himself 
only,  and  not  for  others,  would  say  that  kinghood  is 


ANUMANA    FOR    OTHERS.  569 

pervaded  by  manhood  and  manhood  by  mortality, 
and  therefore  kings  are  mortal. 

It  would  be  easy  to  bring  objections  against  this 
kind  of  reasoning,  and  we  shall  see  that  Indian 
philosophers  themselves  have  not  been  slow  in 
bringing  them  forward,  and  likewise  in  answering 
them.  One  thing  can  be  said  in  favour  of  the 
Indian  method.  If  we  go  on  accumulating  instances 
to  form  an  induction,  if,  as  in  the  afore-mentioned 
case,  we  add  horses,  mules,  men,  and  the  like,  we 
approximate  no  doubt  more  and  more  to  a  general 
rule,  but  we  never  eliminate  all  real,  much  less  all 
possible,  exceptions.  The  Hindu,  on  the  contrary, 
by  saying,  '  Wherever  we  have  seen  the  attribute 
of  little  bile,  we  have  observed  long  life,'  or  better 
still,  '  We  have  never  observed  long  life  without  the 
attribute  of  little  bile,'  and  by  then  giving  a  number 
of  mere  instances,  and  these  by  way  of  illustration 
only,  excludes  the  reality,  though  not  the  possibility, 
of  exceptions.  He  states,  as  a  fact,  that  wherever 
the  one  has  been,  the  other  has  been  seen  likewise, 
and  thus  throws  the  onus  probandi  as  to  any  case 
to  the  contrary  upon  the  other  side.  The  Hindu 
knows  the  nature  of  induction  quite  well  enough 
to  say  in  the  very  words  of  European  philosophers, 
that  because  in  ninety-nine  cases  a  Vyapti l  or  rule 
has  happened  to  be  true,  it  does  not  follow  that 
it  will  be  so  in  the  hundredth  case.  If  it  can  be 
proved,  however,  that  there  never  has  been  an 
instance  where  smoke  was  seen  without  fire,  the 
mutual  inherence  and  inseparable  connection  of 

1  '  Satasah  sahafcaritayor  api  vyabhiMropalabdhe/i.'  Anu- 
manakhawcZa  of  TattvaJtintaniani. 


570  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

smoke  and  fire  is  more  firmly  established  than 
it  would  be  by  any  number  of  accumulated  actual 
instances  where  the  two  have  been  seen  together. 

The  conditions  (Upadhis)  under  which  it  is  allow- 
able to  form  a  Vyapti,  that  is  to  say,  to  form  a  uni- 
versal rule,  have  greatly  occupied  the  thoughts  of 
Hindu  philosophers.  Volumes  after  volumes  have 
been  written  on  the  subject,  and  though  they  may 
not  throw  any  new  light  on  the  origin  of  universals, 
they  furnish  at  all  events  a  curious  parallel  to  the 
endeavours  of  European  philosophers  in  defence 
both  of  inductive  and  deductive  thinking. 

It  seems  hardly  time  as  yet  to  begin  to  criti- 
cise the  inductive  and  the  deductive  methods  as 
elaborated  by  Hindu  philosophers.  We  must  first 
know  them  more  fully.  Such  objections  as  have 
hitherto  been  started  were  certainly  not  unknown 
to  Gotama  and  Ka?^ada  themselves.  In  accordance 
with  their  system  of  Purvapaksha  and  Uttara- 
paksha,  every  conceivable  objection  was  started 
by  them  and  carefully  analysed  and  answered. 
Thus  it  has  been  pointed  out  by  European  philo- 
sophers that  the  proposition  that  wherever  there 
is  smoke  there  is  fire,  would  really  lose  its  universal 
character l  by  the  introduction  of  the  instance,  '  as 
on  the  kitchen  hearth.'  But  the  Hindu  logicians 
also  were  perfectly  aware  of  the  fact  that  this 
instance  is  not  essential  to  a  syllogism.  They  look 
upon  the  instance  simply  as  a  helpful  reminder  for 


1  Ritter,  History  of  Philosophy,  IV,  p.  365,  says  that  'two 
members  of  Kamda's  argument  are  evidently  superfluous, 
while,  by  the  introduction  of  an  example  in  the  third,  the 
universality  of  the  conclusion  is  vitiated.' 


ANUMANA    FOR    OTHERS.  57! 

controversial  purposes,  as  an  illustration  to  assist 
the  memory,  not  as  an  essential  part  of  the  process 
of  the  proof  itself.  It  is  meant  to  remind  us  that 
we  must  look  out  for  a  Vy4pti  between  the  smoke 
which  we  see,  and  the  fire  which  is  implied,  but  not 
seen.  It  is  therefore  in  rhetorical  syllogisms  or 
syllogisms  for  others  only  that  the  instance  has 
its  proper  place.  In  Sutra  I,  35  Gotama  says, 
'  The  third  member  or  example  is  some  familiar 
case  of  the  fact  which,  through  its  having  a 
character  which  is  invariably  attended  by  that 
which  is  to  be  established,  establishes  (in  con- 
junction with  the  reason)  the  existence  of  that 
character  which  is  to  be  established.'  It  is  Indian 
rhetoric  therefore  far  more  than  Indian  logic  that 
is  responsible  for  the  introduction  of  this  third 
member  which  contains  the  objectionable  instance ; 
and  rhetoric,  though  it  is  not  logic,  yet,  as  Whately 
says,  is  an  offshoot  of  logic. 

The  fact  is  that  Gotama  cares  far  more  for  the 
formation  of  a  Vy4pti,  pervasion,  than  for  the 
manner  in  which  it  may  serve  hereafter  as  the  basis 
of  a  syllogism,  which  must  depend  on  the  character 
of  the  Vyapti.  A  Vyapti  was  considered  as  three- 
fold in  the  school  of  Gotama,  as  Anvaya-vyatireki, 
Kevaldnvayi,  and  Kevala-vyatireki.  The  first,  the 
Anvaya-vyatireki,  present  and  absent,  is  illustrated 
by  such  a  case  as,  Where  there  is  smoke,  there  is 
fire,  and  where  fire  is  not,  smoke  is  not.  The 
second,  or  Kevaldnvayi,  i.  e.  present  only,  is  illus- 
trated by  such  a  case  as,  Whatever  is  cognisable 
is  nameable,  where  it  is  impossible  to  bring  forward 
anything  that  is  not  cognisable.  The  third  case, 
or  Kevala-vyatireki,  is  illustrated  by  a  case  such 


572  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

as,  Earth  is  different  from  the  other  elements, 
because  it  is  odorous.  Here  we  could  not  go  on 
and  say,  all  that  is  different  from  the  other 
elements  has  odour,  because  the  only  case  in 
point  (Udaharana)  would  again  be  earth.  But 
we  have  to  say,  what  is  not  different  from  the 
other  elements  is  not  odorous,  as  water  (by  itself). 
But  this  earth  is  not  so,  is  not  inodorous,  and 
therefore  it  is  not  not-different  from  the  other 
elements,  but  different  from  them,  q.  e.  d. 

Much  attention  has  also  been  paid  by  Hindu 
philosophers  to  the  working  of  the  Upadhis  or 
conditions  assigned  to  a  Vyapti.  Thus  in  the 
ordinary  Vyapti  that  there  is  smoke  in  a  mountain, 
because  there  is  fire,  the  presence  of  wet  fuel  was 
an  Upadhi,  or  indispensable  condition.  This  Upadhi 
pervades  what  is  to  be  established  (Sadhya-vyapaka), 
in  this  case,  fire,  but  it  does  not  pervade  what 
establishes  (Sadhana-vyapaka),  i.  e.  smoke,  because 
fire  is  not  pervaded  by  or  invariably  accompanied 
by  wet  fuel,  as,  for  instance,  in  the  case  of  a  red- 
hot  iron  ball,  where  we  have  really  fire  without 
smoke.  Hence  it  would  not  follow  by  necessity 
that  there  is  fire  because  there  is  smoke,  or  that 
there  is  no  fire  because  there  is  no  smoke.  How 
far  the  Indian  mind  may  go  in  these  minutiae  of 
reasoning  may  be  seen  from  the  following  instance 
given  by  Dr.  Ballantyne  in  his  Lectures  on  the 
Nyaya-philosophy,  founded  chiefly  on  the  Tarka- 
saragraha,  p.  59  :— 

'  To  be  the  constant  accompanier  of  what  is  to 
be  established  (Sadhya-vyapakatva)  consists  in  the 
not  being  the  counter-entity  (Apratiyogitva)  of  any 
absolute  non-existence  (Atyantabhava)  having  the 


ANUMANA    FOR    OTHERS.  573 

same  subject  of  inhesion  (Samanadhikara?ia)  as 
that  which  is  to  be  established.  To  be  not  the 
constant  accompanier  of  the  argument  (Sadhana- 
vyapakatva)  consists  in  the  being  the  counter- 
entity  (Pratiyogitva)  of  some  absolute  non-existence 
[not  impossibly]  resident  in  that  which  possesses 
[the  character  tendered  as  an]  argument.' 

The  credit  of  this  translation  belongs  not  to  me, 
but  to  the  late  Dr.  Ballantyne,  who  was  assisted 
in  unravelling  these  cobwebs  of  Nyaya  logic  by  the 
Nyaya-Pandits  of  the  Sanskrit  College  at  Benares. 
Such  native  aid  would  seem  to  be  almost  indispen- 
sable for  such  an  achievement. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

VAISESHIKA   PHILOSOPHY. 

Date  of  Stltras. 

IT  is  fortunate  that  with  regard  to  the  Vaiseshika 
philosophy,  or  rather  with  regard  to  the  Vaiseshika- 
Sutras,  we  are  able  to  fix  a  date  below  which  their 
composition  cannot  be  placed.  In  the  year  1885 
Professor  Leumann,  well  known  by  his  valuable  re- 
searches in  6raina  literature,  published  an  article, 
'  The  old  reports  on  the  schisms  of  the  (rainas,'  in 
the  Indische  Studien,  XVII,  pp.  9  i-i  35.  Among  the 
various  heresies  there  mentioned,  the  sixth,  we  are 
told,  p.  121,  was  founded  by  the  author  of  the  Vai- 
sesiya-sutta  of  the  Chaulti  race,  and  hence  called 
Chauluga1.  If  there  could  be  any  doubt  that  this  is 
meant  for  the  VaLseshika-Sutras  it  would  at  once  be 
dispersed  by  the  144  so-called  points  of  that  system, 
as  mentioned  by  the  author,  6'inabhadra.  (7ina- 
bhadra's  date  is  fixed  by  Professor  Leumann  in  the 
eighth  century  A.D.,  and  is  certainly  not  later.  This, 
it  is  true,  is  no  great  antiquity,  still,  if  we  consider 
the  age  of  our  Samkhya-Sfttras,  referred  now  to  the 
thirteenth  century  A.D.,  even  such  a  date,  if  only 
certain,  would  be  worth  having.  But  we  can  make 
another  step  backward.  Haribhadra,  originally  a 

1  Could  this  be  meant  for  Auluku  ? 


DATE    OF    SUTRAS.  575 

Brahman,  but  converted  to  (rainism,  has  left  us 
a  work  called  the  ShacMarsanasamuMaya-sutram, 
which  contains  a  short  abstract  of  the  six  Darsanas 
in  which  the  Vaiseshika-darsana  is  described  as  the 
sixth,  and  in  that  description  likewise  we  meet  with 
the  most  important  technical  terms  of  the  Vaiseshika. 
This  short  but  important  text  was  published  in  the 
first  volume  of  the  Giornale  della  Societa  Asiatica 
Italiana,  1887,  and  Sanskrit  scholarship  is  greatly 
indebted  to  Professor  C.  Puini  for  this  and  other 
valuable  contributions  of  his  to  6raina  literature. 
The  author,  Haribhadra,  died  in  1055  of  the  Vira-era, 
i.e.  585  Samvat,  that  is  528  A.D.  This  would  give 
us  an  attestation  for  the  Vaiseshika-Sutras  as  early 
as  that  of  the  Samkhya-karikas,  if  not  earlier,  and  it 
is  curious  to  observe  that  in  Haribhadra's  time  the 
number  six  of  the  Dar.sanas  was  already  firmly 
established.  For,  after  describing  the  (i)  Bauddha, 
(2)  Naiyayika,  (3)  Samkhya,  (4)  traina,  (5)  Vaiseshika, 
and  (6)  (raiminiya  systems,  he  remarks,  that  if  some 
consider  the  Vaiseshika  not  altogether  different 
from  the  Nyaya,  there  would  be  only  five  orthodox 
systems  (Astika),  but  that  in  that  case  the  number 
six  could  be  completed  by  the  Lokayita  (sic]  system 
which  he  proceeds  to  describe,  but  which,  of  course, 
is  not  an  Astika,  but  a  most  decided  Nastika  system 
of  philosophy.  It  is  curious  to  observe  that  here 
again  the  Vedanta-philosophy,  and  the  Yoga  also, 
are  passed  over  in  silence  by  the  Grainas,  though,  for 
reasons  explained  before,  we  have  no  right  to  con- 
clude from  this  that  these  systems  had  at  that  time 
not  yet  been  reduced  to  a  systematic  form  like  the 
other  four  Darsanas.  What  we  learn  from  this  passage 
is  that  early  in  the  sixth  century  A.D.  the  Nyaya, 


576  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Samkhya,  Vaiseshika,  and  Purva-Mimamsa  systems 
of  philosophy  formed  the  subject  of  scientific  study 
among  the  (rainas,  and  we  may  hope  that  a  further 
search  for  (zaina  MSS.  may  bring  us  some  new  dis- 
coveries, and  some  further  light  on  the  chronological 
development  of  philosophical  studies  in  India. 

Dates  from  Tibetan  Sources. 

Whenever  we  shall  know  more  of  the  sources  from 
which  Tibetan  writers  derived  their  information 
about  Indian  literary  matters,  more  light  may  possibly 
come  from  thence  on  the  dates  of  the  Indian  philo- 
sophical systems  of  thought  also.  It  is  true  that  the 
introduction  of  Buddhism  into  Tibet  dates  from  the 
eighth  century  only,  but  the  translators  of  Sanskrit 
originals,  such  as  /Santi  Kakshita,  Padma  Sambhava, 
Dharmaklrti,  Dipa??ikara  ^Sri^fiana  and  others,  may 
have  been  in  possession  of  much  earlier  information. 
In  an  account 1  of  King  Kanishka  (85-106  A.D.)  and 
his  Great  Council  under  Vasumitra  and  Purnaka, 
we  read  that  there  was  at  that  time  in  Kashmir  a 
Buddhist  of  the  name  of  Sutra  who  maintained  a 
large  Buddhist  congregation  headed  by  a  sage 
Dharmarakshita,  and  he  is  said  to  have  belonged  to 
the  Vaiseshika  school 2.  This  would  prove  the 
existence  of  the  Vaiseshika  philosophy  in  the  first 
century  A.D.,  a  date  so  welcome  that  we  must  not 
allow  ourselves  to  accept  it  till  we  know  what 
authority  there  was  for  the  Tibetan  writers  to  adopt 
it.  It  is  taken  from  Sumpahi  Choijung,  and  the 
same  authority  states  that  after  the  death  of 

1  Journal  of  Buddhist  Text  Society,  vol.  I,  p.  i  soq. 

2  Ibid.,  vol.  I,  part  3,  p.  19. 


KAtfADA,  577 

Kanishka,  a  rich  householder  of  the  name  of  Jati 
who  lived  at  Asvaparanta  in  the  north,  invited 
Vasunetra,  a  monk  of  the  Vaiseshika  school,  from 
Maru  in  the  west,  and  another,  Gosha  Samgha  from 
Bactria,  and  supported  the  native  clergy,  consisting 
of  three  hundred  thousand  monks,  for  a  period  of 
ten  years. 

Kawada. 

Although  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  have  been  often 
treated  as  sister  philosophies,  we  must,  after 
having  examined  Gotama's  philosophy,  give,  for  the 
sake  of  completeness,  at  least  a  general  outline  of 
Ka^ada's  system  also.  It  does  not  contain  much 
that  is  peculiar  to  it,  and  seems  to  presuppose  much 
that  we  found  already  in  the  other  systems.  Even 
the  theory  of  Anus  or  atoms,  generally  cited  as  its 
peculiar  character,  was  evidently  known  to  the 
Nyaya,  though  it  is  more  fully  developed  by  the 
Vaiseshikas.  It  begins  with  the  usual  promise  of 
teaching  something  from  which  springs  elevation  or 
the  summum  bonum,  and  that  something  Kanada 
calls  Dharma  or  merit.  From  a  particular  kind  of 
merit  springs,  according  to  Kanada,  true  knowledge 
of  certain  Padarthas,  or  categories,  and  from  this 
once  more  the  summum  bonum.  These  categories, 
of  which  we  spoke  before  as  part  of  the  Nyaya- 
philosophy,  embrace  the  whole  realm  of  knowledge, 
and  are  :  (i)  substance,  Dravya  ;  (2)  quality,  Gu/ia  ; 
(3)  action,  Karman ;  (4)  genus  or  community,  Sa- 
manya,  or  what  constitutes  a  genus ;  (5)  species  or 
particularity,  Visesha,  or  what  constitutes  an  indi- 
vidual ;  (6)  inhesion  or  inseparability,  Samavaya  ; 
(7)  according  to  some,  privation  or  negation,  Abhava. 
These  are  to  be  considered  by  means  of  their  mutual 

pp 


578  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

similarities  and  dissimilarities,  that  is,  by  showing 
how  they  differ  and  how  far  they  agree.  Here  we 
have,  indeed,  what  comes  much  nearer  to  Aristotle's 
categories  than  Gotama's  Padarthas.  These  cate- 
gories or  predicaments  were  believed  to  contain  an 
enumeration  of  all  things  capable  of  being  named, 
i.  e.  of  being  known.  If  the  number  of  Aristotle's 
categories  was  controverted,  no  wonder  that  those 
of  Kanada  should  have  met  with  the  same  fate.  It 
has  always  been  a  moot  point  whether  Abhava, 
non-existence,  deserves  a  place  among  them,  while 
some  philosophers  were  anxious  to  add  two  more, 
namely,  $akti,  potentia,  and  Sadmya,  similitude. 

Substances. 

I.  The  substances,  according  to  the  Vaiseshikas, 
are  :  (i)  earth,  P?*ithivi ;  (2)  water,  Apa/i  ;  (3)  light, 
Terras ;   (4)  air,  Vayu  ;  (5)  ether,  Akasa  ;  (6)  time, 
Kala ;   (7)   space,  Dis  ;   (8)  self,  Atman  ;    (9)  mind, 
Manas.     These    substances    cannot    exist    without 
qualities,  as  little  as  qualities  can  exist  without  sub- 
stances.    The  four  at  the  head  of  the  list  are  either 
eternal  or  non-eternal,  and  exist  either  in  the  form  of 
atoms  (Anus)  or  as  material  bodies.     The  non-eternal 
substances  again  exist  as  either  inorganic,  organic,  or 
as  organs  of  sense.     The  impulse  given  to  the  atoms 
comes  from  God,  and  in  that  restricted  sense  the 
Vaiseshika  has  to  be  accepted  as  theistic.     God  is 
Atman  in  its  highest  form.      In  its  lower  form   it 
is  the  individual  soul.     The  former  is  one,  and  one 
only,  the  latter  are  innumerable. 

Qualities. 

II.  The  principal  qualities  of  these  substances  are  : 
(i)   colour,  Ilupa,   in  earth,    water,   and  light  ;  (2) 


ACTIONS.  579 

taste,  Easa,  in  earth  and  water  ;  (3)  smell,  Gandha, 
in  earth ;  (4)  touch,  Sparsa,  in  earth,  water,  light, 
and  air  ;  (5)  number,  Sawkhya,  by  which  we  per- 
ceive one  or  many  ;  (6)  extension  or  quantity,  Pari- 
mana ;  (7)  individuality  or  several ty,  PHthaktva  ;  (8) 
conjunction,  Samyoga  ;  (9)  disjunction,  Yiyoga  ;  (10) 
priority,  Paratva ;  (ii)1  posteriority,  Aparatva ; 
(12)  thought,  Buddhi ;  (13-14)  pleasure  and  pain, 
Sukha-duAkha ;  (15-16)  desire  and  aversion,  IM/ia- 
dveshau  ;  (17) 2  will,  effort,  Prayatna. 

Actions. 

III.  The  principal  actions  affecting  the  substances 
are  :  (i)  throwing  upwards,  Utkshepawa  ;  (2)  throw- 
ing downwards,  Avakshepana  (or  Apa)  ;  (3)  con- 
tracting, Akun&ana ;  (4)  expanding,  Utsarana  (or 
Pras-)  ;  (5)  going,  Gamana.  These  actions  or  move- 
ments are  sometimes  identified  with  or  traced  back 
to  the  Samskaras,  a  word  difficult  to  translate,  and 
which  has  been  rendered  by  dispositions  and  instincts, 
as  applied  to  either  animate  or  inanimate  bodies. 
These  Sawskaras  3  have  an  important  position  both 
in  the  Samkhya-  and  in  the  Bauddha-philosophies. 
In  the  Tarkadipika  Sawskara  is  rendered  even  by 
(7ati  (g&tih  samskaratmika  bhavati),  i.e.  nature  or 
inborn  peculiarity  ;  and  in  the  Tarkasamgraha  it  is 

1  Here  follow  in  some  lists  as  n   to  15,  gravity,  fluidity, 
viscidity,  and  sound.     The  remaining  Guwas  are  said  to  be 
perceptible  by  the  mental  organ  only,  not  by  the  organs  of 
sense. 

2  Here   again   some   authorities   add   Dharma,    virtue,    and 
Adharma,  vice,  Samskara,  faculty  or  disposition,  and  Bhavana, 
imagination. 

8  See  Garbe,  Samkhya,  p.  269  seq. 

P  p  2 


580  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

represented    as    threefold    (VegaA,    Bhavana,    and 
SthitisthapakaA). 

In  the  Sutras  which  follow,  Kanada  tries  to 
point  out  certain  features  which  the  three  categories 
of  substance,  quality,  and  action  share  in  common, 
and  others  which  are  peculiar  to  two,  or  to  one  only. 
In  the  course  of  this  discussion  he  has  frequently  to 
dwell  on  the  effects  which  they  produce,  and  he 
therefore  proceeds  in  the  next  lesson  to  examine  the 
meaning  of  cause  and  effect,  and  likewise  of  genus, 
species,  and  individuals.  It  may  be  that  the  name 
of  Vaiseshika  was  given  to  Ka?iada's  philosophy 
from  the  differences,  or  Viseshas,  which  he  estab- 
lishes between  substances,  qualities,  and  actions, 
or,  it  may  be,  from  Visesha  as  a  name  of  individual 
things,  applicable  therefore  to  atoms.  But  this,  in 
the  absence  of  decisive  evidence,  must  for  the 
present  remain  undetermined. 

Cause. 

As  to  cause  and  effect,  Kawada  remarks  that  cause 
precedes  the  effect,  but  that,  in  order  to  be  a  true 
cause,  it  must  be  a  constant  antecedent,  and  the  effect 
must  be  unconditionally  subsequent  to  it.  There  is 
an  important  and  often  neglected  difference  between 
Karana  and  Kara?<a.  Karawa,  though  it  may  mean 
cause,  is  properly  the  instrumental  cause  only,  or 
simply  the  instrument.  An  axe,  for  instance,  is  the 
Kararza,  or  instrument,  in  felling  a  tree,  but  it  is  not 
the  Kara?ia,  or  cause.  Causes,  according  to  Kanada, 
are  threefold,  intimate,  non-intimate,  and  instru- 
mental. The  threads,  for  instance,  are  the  intimate 
cause  of  the  cloth,  the  sewing  of  the  threads  the  non- 
intimate,  and  the  shuttle  the  instrumental  cause. 


QUALITIES    EXAMINED.  581 

Qualities  Examined. 

In  the  second  book  Kanada  examines  the  qualities 
of  earth,  water,  &c.  He,  like  other  philosophers, 
ascribes  four  qualities  to  earth,  three  to  water,  two 
to  light,  one  to  air  (Akasa).  These  are  the  principal 
and  characteristic  qualities,  but  others  are  mentioned 
afterwards,  making  altogether  fourteen  for  earth, 
such  as  colour,  taste,  smell,  touch,  number,  extension, 
individuality,  conjunction,  disjunction,  genus,  species, 
gravity,  fluidity,  and  permanence  (II,  i,  31).  Quali- 
ties ascribed  to  Isvara,  or  the  Lord,  are  number, 
knowledge,  desire,  and  volition.  In  the  case  of  air, 
which  is  invisible,  he  uses  touch  as  a  proof  of  its 
existence,  also  the  rustling  of  leaves  ;  and  he  does 
this  in  order  to  show  that  air  is  not  one  only. 
Curiously  enough  Kanada,  after  explaining  that 
there  is  no  visible  mark  of  air  (II,  1,15)  but  that  its 
existence  has  to  be  proved  by  inference  and  by  reve- 
lation (II,  i,  17),  takes  the  opportunity  of  proving, 
as  it  were,  by  the  way,  the  existence  of  God  (II,  i ,  1 8) 
by  saying  that  '  work  and  word  are  the  signs  of  the 
substantial  existence  of  beings  different  from  our- 
selves.' This,  at  least,  is  what  the  commentators 
read  in  this  Sutra,  and  they  include  under  beings 
different  from  ourselves,  not  only  God,  but  inspired 
sages  also.  It  seems  difficult  to  understand  how 
such  things  as  earth  and  the  name  of  earth  could  be 
claimed  as  the  work  of  the  sages,  but,  as  far  as  God 
is  concerned,  it  seems  certain  that  Ka^ada  thinks 
he  is  able  to  prove  His  existence,  His  omnipotence 
and  omniscience  by  two  facts,  that  His  name  exists, 
and  that  His  works  exist,  perceptible  to  the  senses. 

Immediately    afterwards,     Ka^ada     proceeds    to 


582  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

prove  the  existence  of  Akasa,  ether,  by  showing 
that  it  must  exist  in  order  to  account  for  the 
existence  of  sound,  which  is  a  quality,  and  as 
such  requires  the  substratum  of  an  eternal  and 
special  substance,  as  shown  before.  The  question 
of  sound  is  treated  again  more  fully  II,  2,  21-37. 

A  distinction  is  made  afterwards  between  charac- 
teristic and  adventitious  qualities.  If  a  garment, 
for  instance,  is  perfumed  by  a  flower,  the  smell  is 
only  an  adventitious  quality  of  the  garment,  while 
it  is  characteristic  in  the  case  of  earth.  Thus  heat 
is  characteristic  of  light,  cold  of  water,  &c. 

Time. 

Time,  which  was  one  of  the  eternal  substances, 
is  declared  to  manifest  its  existence  by  such  marks 
as  priority,  posteriority,  simultaneity,  slowness,  and 
quickness.  The  arguments  in  support  of  the  sub- 
stantiality of  air  and  ether  apply  to  time  also, 
which  is  one,  while  its  division  into  past,  present, 
and  future,  hibernal,  vernal,  and  autumnal,  is  due 
to  extrinsic  circumstances,  such  as  the  sun's  revolu- 
tions. Time  itself  is  one,  eternal,  and  infinite. 

Space. 

Space,  again,  is  proved  by  our  perceiving  that 
one  thing  is  remote  from  or  near  to  another.  Its 
oneness  is  proved  as  in  the  case  of  time  ;  and  its 
apparent  diversity,  such  as  east,  south,  west,  and 
north,  depends  likewise  on  extrinsic  circumstances 
only,  such  as  the  rising  and  setting  of  the  sun. 
Like  time  it  is  one,  eternal,  and  infinite. 

So  far  Kamida  has  been  chiefly  occupied  with 
external  substances,  their  qualities  and  activities, 


MANAS.  583 

and  he  now  proceeds,  according  to  the  prescribed 
order,  to  consider  the  eighth  substance,  viz.  Atman, 
the  Self,  the  first  in  the  list  of  his  sixteen 
Pad4rthas.  Like  Gotama,  Kanada  also  argues 
that  the  Atman  must  be  different  from  the  senses, 
because  while  the  senses  apprehend  each  its  own 
object  only — (i)  the  sense  of  hearing,  sound  ;  (2)  the 
sense  of  smelling,  odour ;  (3)  the  sense  of  tasting, 
savour ;  (4)  the  sense  of  seeing,  colour ;  (5)  the 
sense  of  feeling,  touch ;  it  follows  that  there  must 
be  something  else  to  apprehend  them  all,  the  work 
which  in  other  philosophies  was  ascribed  to  Manas, 
at  least  in  the  first  instance.  Besides,  the  organs 
of  sense  are  but  instruments,  and  as  such  uncon- 
scious, and  they  require  an  agent  who  employs 
them.  If  we  see  a  number  of  chariots  skilfully 
driven,  we  know  there  must  be  a  charioteer,  and 
we  know  also  that  chariots  and  horses  are  different 
from  the  charioteer.  The  same  applies  to  the  senses 
of  the  body  and  to  the  Self,  and  shows  that  the 
senses  by  themselves  could  not  perform  the  work 
that  results  in  cognition.  In  defending  this  argu- 
ment against  all  possible  objections,  Ka?mda,  follow- 
ing the  example  of  Gotama,  is  drawn  away  into 
a  discussion  of  what  is  a  valid  and  what  is  an 
invalid  argument,  and  more  particularly  into  an 
examination  of  what  is  a  Vyapti,  or  an  invariable 
concomitance,  fit  to  serve  as  a  true  foundation  for 
a  syllogism. 

Manas. 

But  he  soon  leaves  this  subject,  and,  without 
finishing  it,  proceeds  to  a  consideration  of  Manas, 
the  ninth  and  last  of  the  Dravyas  or  substances. 


584  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

This,  too,  is  to  him  much  the  same  that  it  was 
to  Gotama,  who  treats  it  as  the  sixth  of  the 
Prameyas.  In  this  place,  as  we  saw,  Manas 
might  be  translated  by  attention  rather  than  by 
mind. 

Anna  or  Atoms. 

What  is  thought  to  be  peculiar  to  Kawada,  nay 
the  distinguishing  feature  of  his  philosophy,  is  the 
theory  of  Anus  or  atoms.  They  take  the  place 
of  the  Tanmatras  in  the  Samkhya-philosophy. 
Though  the  idea  of  an  atom  is  not  unknown  in  the 
Nyaya-philosophy  (Nyaya-Sutras  IV,  2,  4-25),  it  is 
nowhere  so  fully  worked  out  as  in  the  Vaiseshika. 
Ka?iada  argued  that  there  must  be  somewhere  a 
smallest  thing,  that  excludes  further  analysis. 
Without  this  admission,  we  should  have  a  regressus 
ad  infinitum,  a  most  objectionable  process  in  the 
eyes  of  all  Indian  philosophers.  A  mountain,  he 
says,  would  not  be  larger  than  a  mustard  seed. 
These  smallest  and  invisible  particles  are  held  by 
KaTiada  to  be  eternal  in  themselves,  but  non-eternal 
as  aggregates.  As  aggregates  again  they  may  be 
organised,  organs,  and  inorganic.  Thus  the  human 
body  is  earth  organised,  the  power  of  smelling  is  the 
earthly  organ,  stones  are  inorganic. 

It  is,  no  doubt,  very  tempting  to  ascribe  a  Greek 
origin  to  Kanada's  theory  of  atoms.  But  suppose 
that  the  atomic  theory  had  really  been  borrowed 
from  a  Greek  source,  would  it  not  be  strange  that 
Kanada's  atoms  are  supposed  never  to  assume  visible 
dimensions  till  there  is  a  combination  of  three 
double  atoms  (Tryamika),  neither  the  simple  nor 
the  double  atoms  being  supposed  to  be  visible  by 


ANUS    OK    ATOMS.  585 

themselves.  I  do  not  remember  anything  like  this 
in  Epicurean  authors,  and  it  seems  to  me  to  give 
quite  an  independent  character  to  Kanada's  view  of 
the  nature  of  an  atom. 

We  are  told  that  water,  in  its  atomic  state,  is 
eternal,  as  an  aggregate  transient.  Beings  in  the 
realm  of  Varuwa  (god  of  the  sea)  are  organised,  taste 
is  the  watery  organ,  rivers  are  water  inorganic. 

Light  in  its  atomic  state  is  eternal,  as  an  aggregate 
transient.  There  are  organic  luminous  bodies  in  the 
sun,  sight  or  the  visual  ray  is  the  luminous  organ, 
burning  fires  are  inorganic. 

Air,  again,  is  both  atomic  and  an  aggregate. 
Beings  of  the  air,  spirits,  &c.,  are  organised  air  ;  touch 
in  the  skin  is  the  aerial  organ,  wind  is  inorganic  air. 
Here  it  would  seem  as  if  we  had  something  not  very 
unlike  the  doctrine  of  Empedocles,  Taty  ^er  yap  ycuav 
,  vSari  8'  v8a>p  AiQtpi  <$'  aid  f  pa  8lov,  drap  rrvpl 
.  But  though  we  may  discover  the  same 
thought  in  the  philosophies  of  Kanada  and  Empe- 
docles, the  form  which  it  takes  in  India  is  character- 
istically different  from  its  Greek  form. 

Ether  is  always  eternal  and  infinite.  The  sense 
of  hearing  is  the  ethereal  organ  :  nay,  it  is  supposed 
by  some  that  ether  is  actually  contained  in  the  ear. 

As  to  atoms,  they  are  supposed  to  form  first  an 
aggregate  of  two,  then  an  aggregate  of  three  double 
atoms,  then  of  four  triple  atoms,  and  so  on.  While 
single  atoms  are  indestructible,  composite  atoms  are 
by  their  very  nature  liable  to  decomposition,  and, 
in  that  sense,  to  destruction.  An  atom,  by  itself 
invisible,  is  compared  to  the  sixth  part  of  a  mote 
in  a  sunbeam. 


586  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

Samanya. 

IV.  As  to  Samanya,  community,  or,  as  we  should 
say,  genus,  the  fourth  of  Kanada's  categories,  it  is 
supposed  to  be  eternal,  and  a  property  common  to 
several,  and  abiding  in  substance,  in  quality,  and  in 
action.     It  is  distinguished  by  degrees,  as  high  and 
low ;  the  highest  Samanya,  or,  as  we  should  say,  the 
highest  genus  (6rati)  is  Satta,  mere  being,  afterwards 
differentiated  by  Upadhis,  or  limitations,   and  de- 
veloped into  ever  so  many  subordinate  species.     The 
Buddhist  philosophers  naturally  deny  the  existence 
of  such  a  category,  and  maintain  that  all  our  ex- 
perience has  to  do  with  single  objects  only. 

Visesha. 

V.  These  single  objects  are  what  Kanada  compre- 
hends under  his  fifth  category  of  Visesha,  or  that 
which  constitutes  the  individuality  or  separateness  of 
any  object.     This  also  is  supposed  to  abide  in  eternal 
substances,  so  that  it  seems  to  have  been  conceived 
not  as  a  mere  abstraction,  but  as  something  real, 
that  was  there  and  could  be  discovered  by  means  of 
analysis  or  abstraction. 

Samavaya. 

VI.  The  last  category,  with  which  we  have  met 
several  times  before,  is  one  peculiar  to  Indian  philo- 
sophy.    Samavaya  is  translated  by  inhesion  or  in- 
separability.    With  Ka/iada  also  it  is  different  from 
mere  connection,  Samyoga,  such  as  obtains  between 
horse  and  rider,  or  between  milk  and  water  mixed 
together.     There  is  Samavaya  between  threads  and 
cloth,  between  father  and  son,  between  two  halves 
and  a  whole,  between  cause  and  effect,  between  sub- 


ABHAVA.  587 

stances  and  qualities,  the  two  being  interdependent 
and  therefore  inseparable. 

Though  this  relationship  is  known  in  non-Indian 
philosophies,  it  has  not  received  a  name  of  its  own, 
though  such  a  term  might  have  proved  very  useful 
in  several  controversies.  The  relation  between 
thought  and  word,  for  instance,  is  not  Samyoga,  but 
Samavaya,  inseparableness. 

Abhava. 

VII.  In  addition  to  these  six  categories,  some 
logicians  required  a  negative  category  also,  that  of 
Abhava  or  absence.  And  this  also  they  divided  into 
different  kinds,  into  (i)  Pragabhava,  former  not- 
being,  applying  to  the  cloth  before  it  was  woven ; 
(2)  Dhvamsa,  subsequent  non-being,  as  when  a  jar, 
being  smashed,  exists  no  longer  as  a  jar;  and  (3) 
Atyantabhava,  absolute  not-being,  an  impossibility, 
such  as  the  son  of  a  barren  woman  ;  (4)  Anyonya- 
bhava,  reciprocal  negation,  or  mutual  difference, 
such  as  we  see  in  the  case  of  water  and  ice. 

It  may  seem  as  if  the  Vaiseshika  was  rather  a 
disjointed  and  imperfect  system.  And  to  a  cer- 
tain extent  it  is  so.  Though  it  presupposes  a 
knowledge  of  the  Nyaya-system,  it  frequently  goes 
over  the  same  ground  as  the  Nyaya,  though  it  does 
not  quote  verbatim  from  it.  We  should  hardly 
imagine  that  the  Vaiseshika-Sutras  would  argue 
against  Upamana,  or  comparison,  as  a  separate  Pra- 
mana,  in  addition  to  Pratyaksha  (sense)  and  Ariumana 
(inference),  unless  in  some  other  school  it  had  been 
treated  as  an  independent  means  of  knowledge  ;  and 
this  school  was,  as  we  saw,  the  Nyaya,  which  is 
so  far  shown  to  be  anterior  to  the  Vaiseshika-phi- 


588  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

losophy.  Kanada  denies  by  no  means  that  com- 
parison is  a  channel  through  which  knowledge  may 
reach  us,  he  only  holds  that  it  is  not  an  independent 
channel,  but  must  be  taken  as  a  subdivision  of 
another  and  larger  channel,  viz.  Anumana  or  infer- 
ence. He  probably  held  the  same  opinion  about 
$abda,  whether  we  take  it  in  the  sense  of  the  Veda 
or  of  an  utterance  of  a  recognised  authority,  because 
the  recognition  of  such  an  authority  always  implies, 
as  he  rightly  holds,  a  previous  inference  to  support 
it.  He  differs  in  this  respect  from  the  ./Tarvaka 
secularist,  who  denies  the  authority  of  the  Veda  out- 
right, while  Kawada  appeals  to  it  in  several  places. 

A  similar  case  meets  us  in  Gotama'sNyaya-Sutras 
(I,  1 6).  Here,  apparently  without  any  definite 
reason,  Gotama  tells  us  in  a  separate  aphorism  that 
Buddhi  (understanding),  Upalabdhi  (apprehension), 
and  6rftana  (knowing)  are  not  different  in  meaning. 
Why  should  he  say  so,  unless  he  had  wanted  to 
enter  his  protest  against  some  one  else  who  had 
taught  that  they  meant  different  things  ?  Now  this 
some  one  else  could  only  have  been  Kapila,  who 
holds,  as  we  saw,  that  Buddhi  is  a  development  of 
Prakmi  or  unintelligent  nature,  and  that  conscious 
apprehension  (Samvid)  originates  with  the  Purusha 
only.  But  here  again,  though  Gotama  seems  to 
have  had  the  tenets  of  the  Samkhya-school  in  his 
eye,  we  have  no  right  on  this  ground  to  say  that  our 
Samkhya-Sutras  existed  before  the  Nyaya-Sutras 
were  composed.  All  we  are  justified  in  saying  is 
that,  like  all  the  other  systems  of  Indian  philosophy, 
these  two  also  emerged  from  a  common  stratum  in 
which  such  opinions  occupied  the  minds  of  various 
thinkers  long  before  the  final  outcome  settled  down, 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS.  589 

and  was  labelled  by  such  names  as  Sawkhya,  or 
Nyaya,  Kapila,  or  Gotama,  and  long,  of  course,  before 
the  Samkhya-Sutras,  which  we  now  possess,  were 
constructed. 

The  Six  Systems. 

It  must  have  been  observed  how  these  six,  or,  if 
we  include  the  Barhaspatya,  these  seven  systems  of 
philosophy,  though  they  differ  from  each  other  and 
criticise  each  other,  share  nevertheless  so  many  things 
in  common  that  we  can  only  understand  them  as 
products  of  one  and  the  same  soil,  though  cultivated 
by  different  hands.  They  all  promise  to  teach  the 
nature  of  the  soul,  and  its  relation  to  the  Godhead 
or  to  a  Supreme  Being.  They  all  undertake  to 
supply  the  means  of  knowing  the  nature  of  that 
Supreme  Being,  and  through  that  knowledge  to 
pave  the  way  to  supreme  happiness.  They  all  share 
the  conviction  that  there  is  suffering  in  the  world 
which  is  something  irregular,  has  no  right  to  exist, 
and  should  therefore  be  removed.  Though  there  is 
a  strong  religious  vein  running  through  the  six  so- 
called  orthodox  systems,  they  belong  to  a  phase  of 
thought  in  which  not  only  has  the  belief  in  the 
many  Vedic  gods  long  been  superseded  by  a  belief 
in  a  Supreme  Deity,  such  as  Praf/apati,  but  this 
phase  also  has  been  left  behind  to  make  room  for  a 
faith  in  a  Supreme  Power,  or  in  the  Godhead  which 
has  no  name  but  Brahman  or  Sat,  '  I  am  what  1  am.' 
The  Hindus  themselves  make  indeed  a  distinction 
between  the  six  orthodox  systems.  They  have  no 
word  for  orthodox  ;  nay,  we  saw  that  some  of  these 
systems,  though  atheistic,  were  nevertheless  treated 
as  permissible  doctrines,  because  they  acknowledged 
the  authority  of  the  Veda.  Orthodox  might  therefore 


59°  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

be  replaced  by  Vedic ;  and  if  atheism  seems  to  us 
incompatible  with  Vedism  or  Vedic  orthodoxy,  we 
must  remember  that  atheism  with  Indian  philo- 
sophers means  something  very  different  from  what 
it  means  with  us.  It  means  a  denial  of  an  active, 
busy,  personal  or  humanised  god  only,  who  is  called 
Isvara,  the  Lord.  But  behind  him  and  above  him 
Hindu  philosophers  recognised  a  Higher  Power, 
whether  they  called  it  Brahman,  or  Paramatman,  or 
Purusha.  It  was  the  denial  of  that  reality  which  con- 
stituted a  Nastika,  a  real  heretic,  one  who  could  say 
of  this  invisible,  yet  omnipresent  Being,  Na  asti,  '  He 
is  not.'  Buddha  therefore,  as  well  as  B?'ihaspati,  the 
./Tarvaka,  was  a  Nastika,  while  both  the  Yoga  and 
the  Samkhya,  the  former  Sesvara,  with  an  Isvara, 
the  other  Amsvara,  without  an  Isvara,  the  one 
theistic,  the  other  atheistic,  could  be  recognised  as 
orthodox  or  Vedic. 

The  Hindus  themselves  were  fully  aware  that 
some  of  their  systems  of  philosophy  differed  from 
each  other  on  essential  points,  and  that  some  stood 
higher  than  others.  Madhusudana  clearly  looked 
upon  the  Vedanta  as  the  best  of  all  philosophies, 
and  so  did  >Samkara,  provided  he  was  allowed  to 
interpret  the  Sutras  of  Badarayana  according  to  the 
principles  of  his  own  unyielding  Monism.  Madhu- 
sudana, as  we  saw,  treated  the  Samkhya  and  Yoga 
by  themselves  as  different  from  the  two  Mima/?isas, 
Nyaya  and  Vai.veshika,  and  as  belonging  to  Snrn'ti 
rather  than  to  /S'ruti.  Vu//hina-Bhikshu,  a  philo- 
sopher of  considerable  grasp,  while  fully  recognising 
the  difference  between  the  six  systems  of  philosophy, 
tried  to  discover  a  common  truth  behind  them  all, 
and  to  point  out  how  they  can  be  studied  together, 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS.  59 1 

or  rather  in  succession,  and  how  all  of  them  are 
meant  to  lead  honest  students  into  the  way  of  truth. 

In  his  Preface  to  the  Samkhya-Sutras,  so  well 
edited  and  translated  by  Professor  Garbe,  Vi^fiana- 
Bhikshu  says  :  "If  we  read  in  the  BHhadaranyaka 
Upanishad  II,  4,  5,  and  IV,  5,  6,  that  the  Self  must 
be  seen,  must  be  heard,  must  be  pondered  and  medi- 
tated on,  hearing  and  the  rest  are  evidently  pointed 
out  as  means  of  a  direct  vision  of  the  Self,  by  which 
the  highest  object  of  man  can  be  realised.  If  it  is 
asked  how  these  three  things  can  be  achieved,  Snmti 
or  tradition  answers  :  '  It  must  be  heard  from  the 
words  of  the  Veda,  it  must  be  pondered  on  with 
proper  arguments,  and,  after  that,  it  must  be  medi- 
tated on  continuously.  These  are  the  means  of  the 
vision  of  the  Self.' 

'  Meditated  on/  that  is,  by  means  proposed  in 
Yoga-philosophy.  Three  things  are  known  from 
passages  of  the  Veda,  (i)  the  highest  object  of  man, 
(2)  knowledge  essential  for  its  attainment,  (3)  the 
nature  of  the  Atman  or  Self  which  forms  the  object 
of  such  knowledge.  And  it  was  the  purpose  of  the 
Exalted,  as  manifested  in  the  form  of  Kapila,  to 
teach,  in  his  six-chaptered  manual  on  Viveka  or 
distinction  between  Purusha  and  Prakriti,  all  the 
arguments  which  are  supported  by  $ruti. 

If  then  it  should  be  objected  that  we  have  already 
a  logical  treatment  of  these  subjects  in  the  Nyaya 
and   Vaiseshika  systems,    rendering   the    Samkhya 
superfluous,  and  that  it  is  hardly  possible  that  both— 
the  Samkhya  as  well  as  the  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika— 
could  be  means  of  right  knowledge,  considering  that 
each   represents   the   Self  in  a  different    form,   the 
Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  as  with  qualities,  the  Sam- 


592  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

khya  as  without,  thus  clearly  contradicting  each 
other,  we  answer  No,  by  no  means !  Neither  is  the 
Sa?>ikhya  rendered  superfluous  by  the  Nyaya  and 
Vaiseshika,  nor  do  they  contradict  each  other.  They 
differ  from  each  other  so  far  only  as  Nyaya  arid 
Vabeshika  treat  of  the  objects  of  empirical  know- 
ledge, but  the  Sa??ikhya  of  the  highest  truth.  The 
Nyaya  and  Vai.seshika,  as  they  follow  the  common- 
sense  view  that  it  is  the  Self  that  feels  joy  and  pain, 
aim  at  no  more  than  at  the  first  steps  in  knowledge, 
namely  at  the  recognition  of  the  Atman  as  different 
from  the  body,  because  it  is  impossible  to  enter  per 
saltum  into  the  most  abstruse  wisdom.  The  know- 
ledge of  those  preliminary  schools  which  is  attained 
by  simply  removing  the  idea  that  the  Self  is  the 
body  is  no  more  than  an  empirical  comprehension  of 
facts,  in  the  same  manner  as  by  a  removal  of  the 
misapprehension  in  taking  a  man  at  a  distance  for 
a  post,  there  follows  the  apprehension  that  he  has 
hands,  feet,  &c.,  that  is,  a  knowledge  of  the  truth, 
yet  purely  empirical.  If  therefore  we  read  the 
following  verse  from  the  Bhagavad-gita  III,  29  :— 

'  Those  who  are  deceived  by  the  constituent  Gu?ias 
of  Prak?*iti,  cling  to  the  workings  of  the  Gunas 
(Sattva,  Rac/as,  and  Tamas).  Let  therefore  those 
who  know  the  whole  truth  take  care  not  to  distract 
men  of  moderate  understanding  who  do  not  as  yet 
know  the  whole  truth  ;' 

—we  see  that  here  the  followers  of  the  Nyaya  and 
Vaiseshika  systems,  though  they  hold  to  the  false 
belief  that  the  Self  can  be  an  agent,  are  not  treated 
as  totally  in  error,  but  only  as  not  knowing  the 
whole  truth,  if  compared  with  the  Samkhyas,  who 
know  the  whole  truth.  Even  such  knowledge  as 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS.  593 

they  possess,  leads  step  by  step  by  means  of  the 
lower  impassiveness  (Apara-vairagya)  to  liberation  ; 
while  the  knowledge  of  the  Samkhyas  only,  as  com- 
pared with  the  lower  knowledge,  is  absolute  know- 
ledge, and  leads  by  means  of  higher  impassiveness 
(Paravairagya)  straight  to  liberation.  For  it  follows 
from  the  words  quoted  from  the  Bhagavad-gita  that 
he  only  who  knows  that  the  Self  is  never  an  agent, 
can  arrive  at  the  whole  truth,  and  from  hundreds  of 
true  Vedic  texts,  such  as  BHh.  Ar.  Up.  IV,  3,  22  : 
'  Then  he  has  overcome  all  the  sorrows  of  the  heart' ; 
thinking  that  desires,  &c.,  belong  to  the  internal 
organ  (Manas)  only ;  or  Bn'h.  Ar.  Up.  IV,  3,  7  : 
'  He,  remaining  the  same  (the  Self),  wanders 
through  both  worlds,  as  if  thinking,  and  as  if 
moving  (but  not  really) ' ;  or  Bri'h.  Ar.  Up.  IV,  3, 
1 6  :  '  And  whatever  he  may  have  seen  there  he  is 
not  followed  (affected)  by  it ' ;  and  likewise  from 
hundreds  of  similar  passages  in  the  Smrtti,  such 
as  Bhag.  Ill,  27:'  All  works  are  performed  by  the 
constituents  of  matter  (the  Gunas  of  Prakriti) ;  he 
only  who  is  deceived  by  Ahamkara  or  subjectivation 
imagines  that  he  is  the  agent ' ;  and  such  as  V.  P. 
VI,  7,  22  :  'The  Self  consists  of  bliss  (Nirvana)  and 
knowledge  only,  and  is  not  contaminated  (by  the 
Gunas).  The  qualities  (Gunas)  are  full  of  suffering, 
not  of  knowledge,  and  they  belong  to  PrakHti,  not 
to  the  Self — from  all  such  passages  we  say  that  it 
is  clear  that  the  knowledge  proclaimed  by  Nyaya 
and  Vaiseshika  with  regard  to  the  highest  subject 
is  overcome. 

By  this,  however,  we  do  not  mean  to  say  that 
Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika  are  not  means  of  right 
knowledge,  for  their  teaching  is  not  superseded  by 

Q  q 


594  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  Sawkhya  so  far  as  regards  that  portion  which 
treats  of  the  difference  between  Self  and  the  mate- 
rial body.  Here  we  must  follow  the  principle  (laid 
down  in  the  Purva-Mimamsa),  that  what  a  word 
(chiefly)  aims  at,  that  is  its  meaning  ;  (and  apply 
it  to  the  systems  of  philosophy).  The  Nyaya  simply 
repeats  the  popular  idea  that  joy  pertains  to  the 
Self,  without  referring  to  any  further  proofs  ;  and 
this  chapter  therefore  is  not  to  be  considered 
as  really  essential  (or  as  what  the  Nyaya  chiefly 
aims  at). 

But  admitting  that  there  is  here  no  difference  be- 
tween Nyaya-  Vaiseshika  and  the  Samkhya  systems, 
is  there  not  a  clear  contradiction  between  the  Sam- 
khya on  one  side  and  the  Brahma-Mimams&  (Ve- 
danta)  and  the  Yoga  on  the  other  ?  The  former 
denies  the  existence  of  an  eternal  Isvara,  the  two 
others  maintain  it.  Surely  it  cannot  be  said  that 
here  also  the  contradiction  between  these  systems, 
the  atheistic  and  theistic,  can  be  removed  by  simply 
admitting,  as  before,  two  points  of  view,  the  meta- 
physical and  the  empirical,  as  if  the  theistic  doctrine 
existed  only  for  the  sake  of  the  worship  of  the  multi- 
tude. Such  a  decision  would  here  be  impossible. 
The  atheistic  view  that  an  Isvara  is  difficult  to  know 
and  therefore  non-existent,  may  well  have  been 
merely  repeated  by  the  Samkhyas,  as  a  popular 
idea,  and  in  order  to  put  an  end  to  the  desire  of 
men  for  acquiring  a  divine  status  and  divine  honours 
(by  means  of  penance,  &c.),  as  in  the  case  of  the 
Naiyayikas  when  they  say  that  the  Self  possesses 
qualities  (which  must  be  taken  as  merely  a  pro- 
visional remark).  In  the  Veda  or  elsewhere  l.svara, 
the  anthropomorphic  deity,  is  never  explicitly  denied, 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS.  595 

so  that  one  could  say  that  theism  should  be  taken 
as  the  common  popular  view  only. 

In  spite  of  all  this  we  hold  that  here  too  these 
different  views  are  really  due  to  empirical  or  to 
metaphysical  conceptions. 

For  as  works  like  the  Bhagavad-gita  (XVI,  8) 
when  saying: — 

'  Those    say  that    the   world  is   unreal,   without 

support,  without  an  Isvara,' 

condemn  the  atheistic  doctrine,  we  may  very  well 
suppose  that  the  Samkhyas  simply  repeated  a 
common  popular  view  that  there  is  no  Isvara,  in 
order  to  discourage  the  striving  after  a  divine  status 
(so  common  among  Saints),  or  for  some  similar  pur- 
pose. They  would  naturally  think  that  if  they,  so 
far  following  the  materialists,  did  not  deny  the  ex- 
istence of  an  active  Isvara,  the  acquisition  of  the 
discriminating  knowledge  (of  the  Samkhyas,  between 
Prakriti  and  Purusha)  would  be  impeded,  because 
those  who  believe  in  an  infinite,  eternal  and  perfect 
Isvara,  have  their  thoughts  entirely  absorbed  by 
this  Isvara  (so  that  they  might  not  attend  to  the 
essential  doctrine  of  the  Samkhyas).  No  attack  is 
made  anywhere  on  theism,  so  that  the  theistic  doc- 
trine of  the  Vedanta  should  be  restricted  to  sacri- 
ficial and  similar  purposes  only.  But  from  passages 
like  Mahabh.  XII,  1167:  '  No  knowledge  is  equal  to 
that  of  the  Samkhya,  no  power  to  that  of  the  Yoga,' 
and  again  XII,  1 1 198  :  '  Let  there  be  no  doubt,  the 
knowledge  of  the  Samkhya  is  considered  the  highest,' 
we  should  learn  the  excellence  of  the  Samkhya  know- 
ledge as  superior  to  other  systems,  though  only  with 
regard  to  that  portion  which  treats  of  the  distinction 
of  Self  and  PrakHti,  and  not  with  regard  to  the 

Q   q  2 


596  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

portion  that  objects  to  an  Lsvara.  Furthermore  from 
the  consensus  of  Parasara  also  and  all  other  eminent 
authorities,  we  see  that  theism  alone  is  absolutely 
true.  And  from  Parasara's  Upa-pura/?a  and  similar 
works  the  truth  of  the  Brahma-Mimamsa  in  its 
chapter  on  the  isvara  is  perfectly  manifest.  There 
we  read  : — 

'  In  the  systems  of  Akshapada  and  Kawada  (Nyaya 
and  Vaiseshika),  in  the  Samkhya  and  in  the  Yoga, 
whatever  portion  is  in  conflict  with  the  Veda,  that 
has  to  be  rejected  by  all  to  whom  the  Veda  is  the 
only  law/ 

'  In  the  systems  of  (raimini  and  Vyasa  (in  the 
Purva  and  Uttara-Mimamsa)  there  is  nothing  in 
conflict  with  the  Veda  ;  for  these  two  in  their  know- 
ledge of  the  meaning  of  the  Veda  have  by  means  of 
the  Veda  fully  mastered  the  Veda.' 

From  other  passages  also  the  superior  authority 
of  the  Brahma-MimamSca  may  be  gathered,  at  least 
with  regard  to  that  portion  which  treats  of  Isvara. 
Thus  we  read  in  Mahabh.  XII,  7663  seq.  :— 

'  Manifold  philosophical  doctrines  have  been  pro- 
pounded by  various  teachers  ;  but  cling  to  that  only 
which  has  been  settled  by  arguments,  by  the  Veda, 
and  by  the  practice  of  good  people.' 

From  this  passage  of  the  Mokshadharma  also 
(XII,  7663),  and  on  account  of  the  practice  of 
Para-s-ara  and  all  eminent  authorities,  it  follows  that 
the  proof  of  the  existence  of  an  Tsvara,  as  proclaimed 
by  the  Brahma-Mimamsa,  the  Nyaya,  Vaixeshika  and 
other  systems,  is  to  be  accepted  as  the  strongest ; 
and  likewise  because  by  passages  in  the  Kurma  and 
other  Pura^as  the  ignorance  of  the  Sawkhyas  with 
regard  to  an  Isvara  has  been  clearly  pronounced  by 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS.  597 

Narayana  and  others ;  e.  g.  '  Take  thy  refuge  with 
the  beginningless  and  endless  Brahman,  whom  the 
Samkhyas,  though  strong  as  Yogins,  are  unable  to 
perceive.' 

Besides,  that  Isvara  alone  is  the  principal  object 
of  the  Brahma-Mimamsa  is  proved  by  the  very  first 
words  and  by  other  indications.  If  then  it  had  been 
refuted  on  that  principal  point,  the  whole  philosophy 
(the  Brahma-Mimamsa)  would  no  longer  be  a  means 
of  right  knowledge,  according  to  the  principle,  men- 
tioned before,  that  what  a  word  chiefly  aims  at,  that 
is  its  meaning.  The  chief  aim  of  the  Sawkhya,  on 
the  contrary,  is  not  the  denial  of  an  Isvara,  but  the 
highest  object  to  be  obtained  by  the  Self  by  means 
of  the  discrimination  between  body  and  Self  which 
leads  to  it.  Hence,  though  it  be  superseded  in  that 
part  which  treats  of  the  denial  of  the  Isvara,  it  will 
remain  as  a  means  of  right  knowledge,  and  this  once 
more  according  to  the  principle  that  what  a  word 
chiefly  aims  at,  that  is  its  purport.  The  Samkhya 
has  therefore  its  proper  sphere,  and  is  vulnerable  in 
that  part  only  which  treats  of  the  denial  of  the 
Isvara,  the  personal  and  active  god. 

Nor  would  it  be  right  to  say  that  in  the  Brahma- 
Mimamsa  Isvara  may  indeed  be  the  principal  object, 
but  not  its  eternal  lordship  or  godhead.  For,  as 
the  objection  raised  in  the  Purvapaksha  as  to  its 
(the  Mimamsa's)  allowing  no  weight  to  the  other 
Smritis  cannot  be  sustained,  it  is  clear  that  Isvara 
can  only  be  the  object  of  the  Brahma-Mimamsa,  pro- 
vided he  is  characterised  by  eternal  lordship. 

If  it  is  said  that  the  first  Sutra  of  the  Brahma- 
Mimamsa  does  not  say  '  Now  then  a  wish  to  know 
the  highest  Brahman/  and  that  therefore  it  does 


598  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

not  by  the  word  Brahman  mean  the  Parabrahman, 
we  must  not  on  account  of  the  Sarakhya  denial  of 
an  Isvara  suppose  that  the  Vedanta  and  Yoga 
systems  likewise  refer  only  to  an  evolved  Isvara  (a 
Karyesvara,  a  product  of  Prakrfti),  for  in  that  case 
the  whole  string  of  Sutras  from  II,  2,  i,  directed 
against  the  Samkhya  and  showing  that  mindless 
matter,  being  incapable  of  creating,  cannot  be 
established  by  mere  reasoning,  would  be  absurd ; 
for  if  the  God  of  the  Vedanta  were  a  made  God, 
or  a  product  of  matter,  the  Samkhyas  would  have 
been  right  in  teaching  an  independent  matter 
(Prakriti).  Lastly,  the  eternal  character  of  Isvara 
is  quite  clear  from  such  Yoga-Sutras  as  I,  26,  '  He 
(God)  is  the  Guru  even  of  the  oldest  sages,  because 
he  is  not  limited  by  time,'  and  likewise  from 
Vyasa's  commentary  on  that  Sutra.  It  is  clear 
therefore  that  as  the  Sa?7ikhya  means  to  deny  the 
common  popular  anthropomorphic  view  of  Isvara 
only,  whether  as  a  concession,  or  as  a  bold  assertion, 
or,  for  some  other  reason,  there  exists  no  real  con- 
tradiction between  it,  and  the  Brahma-Mimawisa, 
and  the  Yoga. 

Such  concessions  are  found  in  other  authoritative 
works  also,  as,  for  instance,  in  the  Vish/m-Purana, 
I,  17,  83:- 

'  O  Daitya,  these  various  opinions  have  I  declared 
for  those  who  admit  a  difference  (who  are  not  yet 
monists),  by  making  a  concession  (to  dualism).  Let 
this  abstract  of  mine  be  listened  to.' 

Nay  it  is  possible  that  in  some  accredited  systems 
also  opinions  should  have  been  put  forward  in 
contradiction  with  the  Veda  in  order  to  shut  out 
bad  men  from  a  knowledge  of  the  truth.  Such 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS.  599 

parts  would  of  course  not  be  means  of  right  know- 
ledge, but  the  other  and  principal  parts  only,  which 
are  in  harmony  with  $ruti  and  Snm'ti.  Hence  we 
see  that  in  the  Padma-Purana  fault  is  found  with 
all  systems  except  the  Brahma-Mima???s£i  and  Yoga. 
Here  we  see  God  ($iva)  saying  to  Parvati  :— 

'  Listen,  0  goddess,  I  shall  in  succession  tell  you 
the  heretical  theories  by  the  mere  hearing  of  which 
even  sages  lose  their  knowledge. 

First  of  all,  I  myself  have  taught  the  $aiva, 
Pasupata  and  other  systems,  and  afterwards  others 
have  been  promulgated  by  Brahmans,  who  were 
filled  by  my  powers.  Kanada  has  promulgated  the 
great  Vaiseshika  doctrine,  Gautama  the  Nyaya, 
Kapila  the  Samkhya.  The  Brahman  6raimini  has 
composed  a  very  large  work  of  atheistic  character, 
the  first  of  the  two  Mimamsas,  which  treat  of  the 
meaning  of  the  Veda.  Then,  in  order  to  destroy 
the  demons,  Dhishawa  (Bn'haspati)  propounded  the 
altogether  despicable  TTarvaka  system  ;  and  Vishmi, 
under  the  disguise  of  Buddha,  propounded  the  er- 
roneous Bauddha  system  which  teaches  that  people 
are  to  go  naked,  and  should  wear  blue  or  other 
coloured  garments,  while  I  myself,  O  goddess,  under 
the  disguise  of  a  Brahman  (i.e.  of  $amkara)  have 
taught  in  this  Kali  age  the  doctrine  of  illusion 
(Maya)  which  is  false  and  only  a  disguised  Bud- 
dhism. It  is  spread  far  and  wide  in  the  world,  and 
attributes  a  false  meaning  to  the  words  of  the 
Veda.  In  it  it  is  said  that  all  works  should  be 
relinquished,  and  after  surrendering  all  works,  com- 
plete inactivity  is  recommended. 

I  have  taught  in  it  the  identity  of  the  highest 
Self  and  the  individual  Self,  and  have  represented 


600  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

the  highest  form  of  Brahman  as  entirely  free  from 
qualities  ;  and  this  in  order  to  destroy  the  whole 
world  in  this  Kali  age.  This  extensive,  non-Vedic, 
deceptive  doctrine  has  been  propounded  by  me,  as 
if  it  presented  the  true  meaning  of  the  Veda,  in 
order  that  all  living  things  might  perish.' 

All  this  and  more  has  been  explained  by  me  in 
the  commentary  on  the  Brahma-Mima/msa,  and  it  is 
wrong  therefore  to  say  of  any  of  the  admittedly 
orthodox  systems  of  philosophy  that  it  is  not  the 
means  of  right  knowledge  or  that  it  is  refuted  by 
others.  For  in  reality  none  of  them  is  contradicted 
or  refuted  in  what  constitutes  its  own  chief  object. 

But,  if  it  be  asked  whether  the  Sa?wkhya-philo- 
sophy  has  not  likewise  made  a  mere  concession 
with  regard  to  the  multiplicity  of  souls,  we  answer 
decidedly,  No.  For  on  that  point  there  is  really 
no  contradiction  (between  the  two,  Samkhya  and 
Vedanta)  because  it  is  shown  in  the  chapter  which 
begins  at  Brahma-Sutras  II,  3,  43,  and  declares  that 
the  individual  self  is  a  part  of  the  Highest  Self,  be- 
cause the  multiplicity  is  stated  (in  the  Veda) ;  that 
the  Brahma-Mirna?^sa  also  recognises  a  multiplicity  of 
Atman.  But  that  the  individual  souls,  as  conceived 
by  the  Sa???khya,  are  Atman  is  certainly  denied  by 
the  Vedauta,  for  it  follows  from  Sutra  IV,  1,3: 
'  They  know  him  and  teach  him  as  Atman,'  that  to 
the  Vedantins,  from  the  standpoint  of  absolute  truth, 
the  highest  soul  only  is  Atman.  Nevertheless  the 
Samkhya  does  not  thereby  lose  its  authoritative  char- 
acter, because,  it  is  not  superseded  by  the  Vedanta 
in  what  constitutes  its  own  characteristic  doctrine, 
namely  that  for  the  individual  soul,  the  knowledge 
of  its  being  different  from  everything  else,  constitutes 


THE    SIX    SYSTEMS.  6oi 

the  true  means  of  liberation.  There  is  no  contradic- 
tion therefore,  because  the  concepts  of  the  manifold 
Atman  and  of  the  one  Atman,  so  well  known  from 
Veda  and  tradition,  can  be  fully  reconciled  according 
as  we  take  an  empirical  or  metaphysical  view,  as  has 
been  explained  by  ourselves  in  the  Commentary  on 
the  Brahma-Mimamsa — Sapienti  sat." 

I  have  given  here  this  long  extract  from  Vigwana- 
Bhikshu,  though  I  have  to  confess  that  in  several 
places  the  thread  of  the  argument  is  difficult  to 
follow,  even  after  the  care  bestowed  on  disentangling 
it  by  Professor  Garbe.  Still,  even  as  it  is,  it  will 
be  useful,  I  hope,  as  a  good  specimen  of  the  Indian 
way  of  carrying  on  a  philosophical  controversy.  Nay, 
in  spite  of  all  that  has  been  said  against  Vi^fiana- 
Bhikshu,  I  cannot  deny  that  to  a  certain  extent 
he  seems  to  me  right  in  discerning  a  kind  of  unity 
behind  the  variety  of  the  various  -  philosophical 
systems,  each  being  regarded  as  a  step  towards 
the  highest  and  final  truth.  He  certainly  helps 
us  to  understand  how  it  came  to  pass  that  the 
followers  of  systems  which  to  our  mind  seem  directly 
opposed  to  each  other  on  very  important  points, 
managed  to  keep  peace  with  each  other  and  with 
the  Veda,  the  highest  authority  in  all  matters 
religious,  philosophical  and  moral.  The  idea  that 
the  largely  accepted  interpretation  of  the  Vedanta- 
Sutras  by  $amkara  was  a  perversion  of  the  Veda 
and  of  Badarayana's  Sutras,  not  much  better  than 
Buddhism,  nay  that  Buddhism  was  the  work  of 
Vishwu,  intended  for  the  destruction  of  unbelievers, 
is  very  extraordinary,  and  evidently  of  late  origin. 
Nay,  nothing  seems  to  me  to  show  better  that  these 
Pura^as,  in  the  form  in  which  we  possess  them,  are 


602  INDIAN    PHILOSOPHY. 

of  recent  origin,  and  certainly  not  the  outcome  of 
a  period  previous  to  the  Renaissance  of  Sanskrit 
literature,  than  passages  like  those  quoted  by  Vi#- 
rlana-Bhikshu,  representing  the  gods  of  the  modern 
Hindu  pantheon  as  interfering  with  the  ancient 
philosophy  of  India,  and  propounding  views  which 
they  know  to  be  erroneous  with  the  intention  of 
deceiving  mankind.  Whatever  the  age  of  our  philo- 
sophical Sutras  may  be,  and  some  of  them,  in  the 
form  in  which  we  possess  them,  are  certainly  more 
modern  than  our  Puranas,  yet  the  tradition  or  Pa- 
rampara  which  they  represent  must  be  much  older  ; 
and  in  trying  to  enter  into  the  spirit  of  the  Six 
Systems,  we  must  implicitly  trust  to  their  guidance, 
without  allowing  ourselves  to  be  disturbed  by  the 
fancies  of  later  sects. 


INDKX. 


ABDAYASES,  nephew  of  K.  Gon- 
daphores,  found  on  Indo- Par- 
thian coins,  83. 

Abhassara,  spirits,  23. 

Abhava,  587. 

—  not-being,  266,  518. 
Abhibuddhis,  the  five,  348. 
Absorption,   no   part  of  the  Yoga 

system,  405. 
Actions,  579. 
Adhibhautika,    pain     from     other 

living  beings,  360. 
Adhidaivika,     pain     from     divine 

agents,  360. 
Adhikara-vidhis,  262. 
Adhyatma,  Adhibhuta,  and  Adhi- 

daivata,  346. 
Adhyatmika,  pain  from  the  body, 

360. 

Adhyavasaya,  determination,  227. 
Adi-purusha,  the  First  Self,  431. 

—  a  first  Purusha,  434. 

Aditi,  identified  with  sky  and  air, 

the  gods,  &c.,  52. 
Adityas,  seven  in  number,  50. 

—  later  raised  to  twelve,  51. 
Adnshte  or  Apurva,  364. 

Agra,  doubtful  meaning  of,  103. 

Agama,^used  by  Patangrali  instead 
of  Aptava/rana,  442. 

Agatasatru  and  Balaki,  18,  35. 

Agratasatru,  K.  of  Kasi,  son  of  Vai- 
dehi,  31. 

Aghora,  not  terrible,  329. 

Agrita  Kesakambali,  teacher  men- 
tioned in  Buddhist  annals,  1 1 7. 

A.5rivaka,Go.sali,  originally  an,  117. 

Afirivakos,  315. 

A<;/7anavada,  Agnosticism,  25. 

Agni  as  Indra  and  Savitri,  52. 

Ahawtkara,  subjectivation,  326,  328, 
382. 

—  a  cosmic  power,  327. 

—  modifications  of  the,  327. 


Ahawzkara,  mental  act,  327. 

—  of  three  kinds,  346. 

—  the  cause  of  creation,  371. 

—  personal  feelings,  558. 
Aisvaryas,  or  superhuman  powers, 

296. 

Aitihya,  tradition,  518,  562. 
Akasa,    fifth    element,    vehicle   of 

sound,  523,  582. 
Akhyayikas,  or  stories,  294,  319. 

—  absent  in  the  Tattva-samasa  and 

the  Karikas,  319. 

—  reappear  in  the  Sawkhya-Sutras, 

3!9- 

A/cit,  matter,  246. 
Akn'tis,  species,  331. 
Aksha,  organ,  33 1 . 
Akshapada  and  Kanada,  596. 
Alara  Kalama,  26. 
Alberuni,  290-1. 
Alexander  and  Indian  philosophy, 

5°5- 

Alexandria,    known   as    Alasando, 
saec.  Ill,  83. 

—  Brahmans  did  not  borrow  ideas 

from,  196. 

—  did  Brahmans  come  to  ?  523. 

—  Logos-idea,  no  antecedents  of  it 

in  Greek  philosophy,  74. 
Aliwga,  i.e.  Prakriti,  447  n. 
American  Indians,  their  sweating 

processes,  409. 
AmurfAa,  not  stupid,  329. 
Ananda,    or   bliss    in   the    highest 

Brahman,  487. 
Anarabhyadhita,  263. 
Anathapindika,  33. 
Aniruddha,  246. 

Ann'ta,  unreal  written  letters,  121. 
Antanantikas,  24. 
Anugraha-sarga,  356. 
Anumana,  or  inference,  189. 

—  applied  by  Badarayawa  to  Smriti, 

tradition,  193. 


604 


INDEX. 


Anumana,  for  others,  565. 
Anus,  or  atoms,  558,  577,  584. 
Anusaya,  Anlage,  232. 
Anusravika,  revealed,  444. 
Anuttamambhasika,  352. 
Anvaya-vyatireki,  571. 
Anvikshiki,  old  name  of  philosophy, 
99. 

—  bifurcation  of  the  old  system  of, 

475- 

Anyatva,  355. 

Apara,  lower  knowledge,  215. 

Apara-vairagya,  lower  impassive- 
ness,  593. 

Apaurusheyatva,  non-human  origin 
of  the  Vedas,  271. 

Apavarga,  or  final  beatitude,   503, 

552- 

—  bliss  of  the  Nyaya,  488. 
Apotheosis,  366. 
Application,  Upanaya,  566. 
Apramoda,  353. 
Apramodamaiia,  353. 
Apramudita,  353. 
Aprasuta,  not  produced.  322. 
Apratiyogitva,  572. 

Apta,  not  to  be  translated  by  aphis, 

191. 

Aptavafcana,  the  true  word,  305. 
Apta-vafcana,     359. 
Aptopadesa  =  AptavaArana,  190. 
Apurva-pririciple,  276. 

—  miraculous,  276. 

Ararfa,  teacher   of  Sawkhya-philo- 

sophy,  311,  312. 
Arambha-vada,    theory   of  atomic 

agglomeration,  106. 
Aranyakas,  distinction  of  parts  of, 

into  Upanishads  and  Vedantas, 

1 1 1. 

Arasya,  353. 
Arfra&,  the,  157. 
Artabhaga,  15. 

Arthn,  objects  of  the  senses,  214. 
Arthapatti,  assumption,  518. 
Arthavadas,  glosses,  274. 
A.sakti,  weakness,  351. 
A.santa,  not-pleasurable,  329. 
Asat-karyavada,  peculiar  to  Nyaya 

and  Vaiseshika,  2o<S. 
Asatpramuditam,  353. 
A.saya,  Anlage,  419. 
Asiddhis  and  Siddhis,  352. 
Asmarathya,  referred  to  by  Bilda- 

rayana,  1 1 9. 
Asmita,  different  from  Ahamkara, 

44911. 

Asoka,  King,  263  B.C.,  34. 
Asrama,  not  found  in  tlie  classical 

Upanisbads,  310. 
Asramas    of  the    Buddhists,    only 


two,  Grihins    and    Bhikkhus, 

3io. 

Asramas,  stations  in  life,  133. 
.Asramin  in  the  Maitray.  Up.,  310. 
Assertion,  Pratigr/ia,  566. 
Astitva,  reality.  355. 
Asumarifrika,  352. 
Asunetra,  352. 
Asupara,  352. 
Asura,  name  given  to  Tvashtrf,  and 

to  his  son  Visvarupa,  58. 
Asuri,  386. 
Asutara,  352. 
Asvaghosha's  Buddha-fcarita,    first 

cent.  A.  D.,  31 1. 
Asvala,  15. 

Asvalayana  Gn'hya-Sutras,  313. 
Asvapati  Kaikeya,  19. 
Atara.  352. 
Ataratara,  353. 
Atheism    of    Purva-Mimawsa,    the 

supposed,  275. 

—  of  Kapila,  395. 

—  attributed  to  the  Vaiseshika  and 

Nyaya  and  Purva-Mimamsa, 
428. 

Ativahika-sarira  formed  of  eighteen 
elements,  395. 

Atma-anatma-viveka,  374. 

Atmadarsanayogyata,ntness  for  be- 
holding tlie  Self,  468. 

Atman,  taught  by  Kshatriyas,  19. 

—  '  in  every  created  thing,'  93. 

—  etymology  of,  94. 

—  =  breath  in  Veda,  the  life,  soul. 

94- 

—  the  name  of  the  highest  person, 

95- 

—  and  Purusha,  374. 
—  not  cognitive,  432. 

Atom,    invisible,    sixth   part    of   a 

mote.  585. 
Atoms,  Greek  origin  of,  theory  of, 

584. 
Atreya,  referred  to  by  Badarayana, 

119. 

Atushd  and  Tush/i,  352. 
Atyantabhava,  57.'. 
Au</ulomi,  referred  to  by  Badara- 

yawa,  1 19. 
Avapa,  265. 
Avayavas,    or    Premisses,    i.  o.    the 

members  of  a    syllogism,   500, 

504. 

Avidya,  history  of,  211. 
- —  changed    t<>    a   .S'akti    or  potenlia 

»f  Brahman,  221. 

—  not  to  be  acconntoil  for,  225. 

—  applied    to  Kant's   intuitions  of 

sense  and  his  categories,  226. 

—  and  Mithytu/Sana,  243. 


INDEX. 


605 


Avidya,  Nescience,  351,  373. 

—  an  actual  power,  Sakti,  368. 

—  origin  of,  378. 

Avijra,  not  having  a  seed,  448. 
Avinabhava,       Not-without-being. 

493- 

Aviruddhakos,  315. 
Avisesha,  subtle  elements,  447  n. 
Aviveka,  373. 

Avividisha,  carelessness,  348,  349. 
Avrtshri,  352. 
Avyakta,  247. 

—  producing,  Prasuta,  322. 

—  doubtful  meaning  of,  103. 

—  chaos,  321. 

Awake,  state  of  being,  229. 
Ayur-veda,  541. 


BABARA     PRAVAHAAT:,     signi- 

ficative name,  273. 
Babylonian  hymns,  more  modern 

in  thought  than  those  of  Rig- 

veda,  45. 
Badarayana,   author  of  one  of  the 

Mimawsas,  in,  153,  167. 

—  referred  to  by,  119. 

—  identified  with  Vyasa,  148. 

—  quotes  Gnimini,  259. 

Badari.  referred  to  by  Badarayana, 

119. 

Bahutva,  355. 

Bawa  knows  Kapilas,  Kanadas,  316. 
Bawa's  Harsha/carita,  600  A.  D.,  316. 
Bandha,  bondage,  357. 
Bandhas,  or  bindings.  457. 
Bante,  Buddhist  title.  21. 
Barhaspatya,  studied  by  Buddha, 

127. 
Bathing,    (graduating)  the    pupil, 

269. 

Berkeley,  254. 
Bhadrasana,  457. 
Bhagavatas,  followers  of  Krishna, 

41. 
Bhartn'hari,  date  of  death,  650  A.D., 

118,  444,  531. 

—  refers  to  the  Darsanas,  1  1  8. 
Bhatfa,  529. 

Bhava,  the  real  world,  the  cause 

of  Samadhi,  450. 
Bhikkhu,  name  of,  309. 
Bhikshafcarya,  or  begging,  309. 
Bhikshafcarya  and  Bhaikshafcarya, 

3°9>  310- 
Bhikshu-Sutras,  loss  of,  referred  to 

by  BhaskaraA'arya.  113. 
--  Parasarya,  the  author,  127. 
--  same  as  Vedanta-Sutras,  154. 
Bhikshus,  mendicants,  32,  41. 
Bhuta-sarga,  356. 
Bhutadi.  327,  328. 


Bhutatman,     elementary    Atman, 

341- 

Bimbisara,  21,  35. 
Boar — legend  that  it  brought  forth 

the  earth,  allusions  in  Brah- 

mawas,  96. 
Bodda,  name  found  among  followers 

of  Mani,  84. 
Boddo  (on  coins),  name  of  Buddha, 

36. 

Bodhayana,  153,  301. 
Body,  a  subtle  and  a  gross,  393. 

—  Sarira,  545. 

—  is  it  the  same  as  Atman,  545. 
Brahma,   creator,  with  Buddhists, 
24. 

—  called  Vasudeva,  246. 
Brahmadatta,  22. 
Brahma-grala-sutta,  21. 
Brahman,  various  meanings,  68. 

—  identified  with  speech,  85. 

—  is  the  sun,  185. 

—  is  Manas,  185. 

—  is  food,  185. 

—  is  Vifirfiana,  185. 

—  as  the  Word,  the  first  creation 

of  divine  thought,  190. 196,  197, 
520. 

—  or  Vafc  or  Bn'h,  eternal,  197. 

—  is  everything,  226. 

—  as    the    Kantian    Ding   an    sich, 

226. 

—  is  the  world,  367. 

—  may  become  to  us  Brahma,  368. 
• —  of  the  Vedanta,  374. 

—  is  Anirva/caniya.  undefinable,  378. 

Brahmawa,  a  social  title,  22. 

Brahmawas  consist  of  Vidhis,  in- 
junctions and  Arthavadas, 
glosses,  262. 

Brahmans,   two,    Saguna  and  Nir- 

guna,  220. 
Bn'h,  parallel  form  of  Vn'dh,  71. 

—  =  to    grow,    c.  p.    Latin    verbum 

and  German  wort,  72. 

—  speech,  520. 

Bn'haspati,  synonymous  with  VaA-as- 
pati,  lord  of  speech,  71. 

—  Sutras,  lost,  113. 

—  philosophy,  123. 

—  Laukya,  124. 

• — Arigirasa,  124,  125. 
Budh,  means  to  awake,  371. 
Buddha,  a  Kshatriya,  14. 

—  guru,  identified  with  Pythagoras, 

79- 

—  works  studied  by,  127. 

—  did  not  borrow  from  Kapila,  1 36. 

—  subjects  known  to,  151. 

—  borrowed   from  Kapila   no   evi- 

dence that,  or  vice  versa,  389. 


6o6 


INDEX. 


Buddha,  later  than  the  classical 
Upanishads,  411. 

—  declared  against  Yoga  tortures, 

4i3- 
Buddha's  mother,  name  of.  122. 

—  denial  of  an  Atman  or  Brahman, 

414. 
Buddhi,  intellect,  322,  502. 

—  or   Mahat,    in    a    cosmic    sense, 

323. 

—  the  lighting  up  of  Prakriti,  370. 

—  of  Nyaya  different  from  that  of 

the  Samkhyas,  548. 

Buddhindriyas,  five,  330. 

Buddhism,  subsequent  to  Upani- 
shads, 309. 

—  in   Tibet,    eighth   century  A.  D., 

576. 
Buddhist-Suttas,  reduced  to  writing 

in  the  first  century  B.C.,  312. 
Buddhists  support  Asatkaryavada, 

208. 

—  derive  the  real  from  the  unreal, 

397- 

—  paid  little  attention  to  the  two 

Mimamsas,  478. 

—  deny  present  time,  515. 

Butta  (first  Greek  mention  of 
Buddha  by  Clement  of  Alexan- 
dria^, 36. 

CALF,  the  new-born  year,  67. 
Case,    five    members    of   a    (Adhi- 

kararta),  267. 
Caste,  Portug.  casta,  n. 
Castes,  origin  of,  in  India,  12. 
Categories  of  the  Nyaya,  577. 
Causal  state  of  Brahman,  247. 
Cause  and  effect,  Vedantist  theory 

of,  203. 
with  them  are  the  same  thing, 

seen  from  different  points,  203. 
Causes,  are  intimate,  non-intimate, 

and  instrumental,  580. 
Chronology  of  thought,  158. 
Cleanthes  and  Boethius,  422. 
Clement  of  Alexandria,  36. 

knows  name  of  Butta,  81. 

Coining  money.  So. 
Colebrooke  on  the  Guwas,  344. 
Comparison.  Upamana,  R.OO. 
Conclusion,  Nigamana,  566. 
Conditions,    Upadhis,    of    forming 

a   Vyapti,    or    universal    rule, 

57p- 

Con-scientia.  Saw-vid,  470. 
Consideration,  Paramar.sa,  563. 
Creation,  or  causation,  203. 

—  the  result  of  Nescience,  203. 

—  proceeds  from  Brahman,  206. 

—  caused  by  Maya  or  AvidyA,  251. 


Cripple  who  could  not  walk,  and 
cripple  who  could  not  see,  396. 

DAKSHA,  force,   one  meaning  of 

Brahman,  92. 
Dakshina-bandha,  bondage,  306. 

—  gifts  to  priests.  357. 
Damascius  says  Brahmans  lived  at 

Alexandria  saec.  V,  81. 

Dandasana,  457. 

Darsanas,  or  systems,  the  six  all 
orthodox,  377. 

Death,  state  of,  229. 

Deity,  existence  of  a,  553. 

Deussen,  Professor,  theory  of  evo- 
lution of  Word  and  Brahman, 
92. 

Deva,  supreme,  never  asserted  by 
Kapila,  396. 

Devadhammikos,  315. 

—  worshippers  of  the  Devas,  316. 

Devas,  thirty-three  in  number,  ac- 
cording to  Rig-veda  and  A  vesta, 
difficulty  of  filling  up  this 
number,  50. 

Devayana,  path  of  the  gods,  231. 
Devotion  to  the  Lord,  one  of  many 

expedients,  418. 
Dharma,  duty,  261. 
Dharmakirtti,  seventh  century,  478, 

479>  576- 

Dharmamegha,  cloud  of  virtue,  471. 

Dharmarakshita,  a  sage,  576. 

Dharmottara,  ninth  century,  de- 
fended Dharmakirtti,  479. 

Dhatri,  maker,  name  given  to  the 
one  god,  62. 

Dhishawa  (Brzhaspati),  599. 

Dlm'ti,  energy,  348. 

Dhyanas  (GMna\  four,  26. 

Dignaga,  the  logician,  476,  477. 

Digniiga's  writings  lost,  479  n. 

—  Nyaya-samufrA-aya,  a  Tibetan 
translation  of,  479  n. 

Dipawtkara  Sriflnana,  576. 

Distinction  of  good  and  evil,  236. 

Diviikara,  a  sage,  600  A.  D.,  40. 

Divine  thinker,  every  word  an  act 
of  a,  196. 

Divyadasa  Datta,  living  Vedantist, 
203,  216. 

Dosha,  faults,  552. 

Dreaming,  state  of,  229. 

Drishfcim.  what  is  seen,  359. 

Drtshfcinta,  example,  504. 

Drumstick  and  drum  together  con- 
vey, even  to  the  deaf,  the  idea 
of  sound,  498. 

Dual  gods,  two  or  three  gods  work- 
ing together,  tendency  towards 
unity  among  the  gods,  52. 


INDEX. 


607 


Duftkha,  pain,  552. 
Duftkhanta,  or  Nirvana,  142. 

EFFECT,  an,  only  a  new  manifesta- 
tion, dogma  characteristic  of 
the  Sawkhya,  208. 

Ekagrata,  concentration,  468. 

Emancipation,  Apavarga,  557. 

Eschatology,  229. 

Esse  is  percipi  or  percipere,  382. 

Eternal  punishment,  362. 

Evolution,  Pariwama,  367. 

—  of  works,  the  independent,  434. 
Exercises,  Abhyasa,  443. 
Exposition,  five-membered  form  of, 

566. 

FABLES  in  the  Sutras,  399. 
Fa-hian  visits  India,  399-414  A.D., 

36. 

Fancy  chiefly  due  to  words.  442. 
Fetishism  or  Totemism,   did   they 

precede  the  Aryan  theogony  ? 

48. 
Fifth  element,  called  d/caT-oi/ojuaroi', 

506. 
First  and  last  inference,  Vita,  or 

straightforward,  500 
Fivefold  division  of  the  vital  spirit, 

228. 
Four  or  five  elements,  the,  131. 

—  states,  the,  229. 

—  Pramawas,  according  to  Gotama, 

490. 
Freedom  from  passions,  Yairagya, 

443- 

—  or  beatitude  depends  on  philo- 

sophy, 512. 
Frog-wife,  the,  401. 

GAIMINI,    author   of  one   of    the 
MimarMsas,  1 1 1 . 

—  referred  to  by  Badarayawa,  ny. 

—  his  work  atheistic,  599. 

—  and  Vyasa,  596. 

—  Sutras,  contents  of,  263. 
Gaina  literature,  574. 
Gainas,  in  white  robes,  41. 
Galpa,  sophistical  wrangling,  509. 
Gamgesa    Upadhyaya,     fourteenth 

century,  479. 
Gamaka,  king  of  Mithila,  the  Vide- 

ha,  14,  16,  34. 

Ganganatha  Jha,  of  Bombay,  416. 
Gargi  Vafcaknavi,  15. 
Gati,  kith  and  caste,  13. 
- —  birth    or    genus,    a    transitio  in 

cdterum  genus,  510. 

—  futility,  509-510. 
Gatilakos,  315. 
Gauc&ipada,  date  of,  292. 


Gauri-Samkar,  Mount,  241. 

Ghora,  fearful,  331. 

Ginabhadra,  eighth  century,  574. 

Givanmukti,  236. 

Gnanayoga,  407. 

G/iatiputra,   teacher   mentioned   in 

Buddhist  annals,  the  Nirgran- 

tha,  founder  of  Gainism,  1  1  7. 
Gnomina,  nomina,  492. 
God     in     the     beginning     created 

names   and   forms    of    things, 

522. 
Gods    of    the    Veclic    people,    the 

agents  postulated  behind   the 

great  phenomena  of  nature,  47. 
Gondaphoros,    king,    authenticated 

as  Gondophares,  83. 
GSrres  on  Sk.  terms  retained  by  the 

Greeks,  506. 

Gosha-Samgha,  from  Bactria,  577. 
Gosaliputra,  teacher  mentioned  in 

Buddhist  Annals,  117. 
Gotama,    philosophy     of    Kawada. 

philosophy  of,  105. 
Gotamakos,  315. 
Greek  accounts  of  India,  34. 
Guwas,  constituents  of  nature,  146. 

—  the  three,  146,  282,  334,  335,  344, 

468. 

—  as  Dravyani,  matter,  345. 

—  equilibrium  of  the  three,  345. 

—  of  Prakriti,  445. 

—  not    qualities,    but    substantial. 

468. 
Gyotishtoma  sacrifice,  274- 

HAMMER  OF  FOLLY,  Mohamud- 


Haribhadra,   his   Sha/darsana-sam- 
ufcfcaya-sutram,  575. 

—  died,  528  A.D.,  575. 
Harihara,  336,  410. 
Harsha,  King,  600  A.  D.,  36. 

—  history  of,  by  Bawa,  40. 

—  court  of,  478. 

HaMa,  or  Kriya-yoga,  451,  453. 
Head,  forfeited  in  disputations,  17. 
Heart,  seat  of  consciousness,  467. 
Hegel's  thesis,  antithesis,  and  syn- 

thesis, 345. 
Henotheism  =  phase  in  which  God 

is  addressed  as  if  the  only  god 

in  existence,  with  forgetfulness 

of  all  others,  53. 
Herbart's  Selbsterhaltung  des  Realm. 

209. 

—  philosophy,  228. 
Hetvabhasas,    specious   arguments, 

four  kinds,  509. 

Hiouen-thsang,   Buddhist  pilgrim, 
visits  India,  629-645  A.  D.,  36. 


6o8 


INDEX. 


Hiouen-thsang,    did   not  translate 

the  Vaiseshika-Sutras   by   Ka- 

nada,  317. 

Hirawyagarbha,  336,  410. 
Holenmerian    theory    of    Plotinus 

and  Henry  More,  227. 
Homoiousia,  421. 
Human  souls  reborn  in  animal  and 

vegetable    bodies    (in    Upani- 

shads),  137. 

Hume's  view  of  causality,  208. 
Hyades,  stars  marking  time  of  rain, 

49- 

Hylobioi,  forest-dwellers,  35. 
Hymn  to  the  Unknown  God,  60. 
Hymns,  adaptations  of,  264. 
Hypnotic  states,  how  produced,  465. 
Hypnotism,  458. 

ICHNEUMON  AND  SNAKE,  498. 
Idealism,  is  Samkhya  ?  384. 
Identity,  Sabhavyam,  232. 
Idolatry,  a  necessity  of  our  nature, 

216. 

Ignorance,  or  Mithyagmana,  512. 
Immortality  of  the  soul,  138. 
India,  a  nation  of  philosophers,  9. 

—  early  philosophers  in,  10. 
Indian  coinage,  80. 

—  leaven  in  our  thoughts,  255. 

—  philosophy,  books  on,  481-483. 
Individual   soul   is   Brahman,   not 

vice  versa,  102. 
Indra,  the  miner,  46. 
Indriyajraya,  subjugation  of  senses, 

468. 
Indriyas,  five  senses,  213. 

—  sense,  227. 
Indu,  the  rain,  46. 
Inference,  Anumana,  496. 

—  three  kinds  of,  497,  500. 

—  Snrn'ti,  52 1. 
Instance.  Udaharana,  566. 
Inward-turned    thought,    Pratyak- 

fcetand,  424. 

I.svara   exists   phenomenally   only, 
222. 

—  the  Lord,  246. 

—  Krishna,  293. 

—  or  personal  Lord,  denial  of,  not 

in  the  original  Samkhya,  302. 

—  not  a  popiilar  name  for  God,  418. 

—  a  Purusha,  419. 

—  one  of  many  souls,  426. 

—  perception  of  the,  429. 
fsvara,  a  maker,  a  Sat-kara,  430. 
Isvaras,  not  many,  420. 

JATI,  of  Asvaparanta,  577. 
KAIVALYA,  aloneness,  389. 


Kaivalya-pada,  438. 

—  means  isolation  of  the  soul,  438. 
Kaivalya,  455,  471. 

Kaiyate,  529. 

A'akrapravartana,  the  turning  of 
the  wheel,  32. 

Kakuda  Katyayana,  teacher  men- 
tioned in  Buddhist  annals, 
117. 

Kalanos    (Kalyawa)   gymnosophist, 

505- 
Kalidasa,    alludes   to   the   logician 

Dignaga,  477. 
Kawada,  577. 
Jfandrakanta  Tarkalankura,  author 

of  Sanskrit  treatise,  1 14. 
Kanishka,  King,  85-106  A. D.,  576. 

—  —    his    Great    Council,    under 

Vasumitru  and  Purwaka,  576. 
iTan-ti,  not  a  good  Chinese  scholar, 

291. 

Kapila  and  Patangrali,  402. 
Kapila  and  Buddha,  existence  side 

by  side  of  their  systems,  414. 
Kapila  appeals  to  the  Veda,  428. 
Kapila's  atheism,  395. 
Kapila,  did  Buddha  borrow  from  ? 

3'4- 

Kapila  did  not  borrow  from  Buddha, 
136. 

Kapila-Sutras,  age  of,  288. 

Kapila  revived  the  Samkhya,  319  n. 

Kapila-vastu  or  vastu,  birthplace 
of  Buddha,  312. 

Kapya  Patanfcala,  402  n. 

Karana  and  Karawa,  difference  be- 
tween, 580. 

Karawavastha,  causal  state  of  Brah- 
man, 144,  247. 

Karman,  143. 

—  or  deed,  224. 
Karmans,  theory  of,  432. 
Karmatmans,  328,  350. 
Karmayoga,  407. 
Karmayonis,  five,  348. 
Karmendriyas,  five,  330. 
Karshn%ini,  referred  to  by  Badara- 

yawa,  119. 

.KTirva,  synonym  of  Buddha,  130. 
Xarvaka,  130. 
—  system,  599. 
Juirvakas  admitted  but  one  source 

of  knowledge,  1X7. 

—  sensualists,  113. 

Karya-kAranabheda,  the  non-differ- 
ence, or  substantial  identity, 
of  cause  and  effect,  204. 

Kuryesvara,  598. 

KA.sakntsn.i,  referred  to  by  Badara- 

yana,  1 19. 
Kasawara  of  Japan,  died,  292. 


INDEX. 


609 


KatantraAMandaAprakriya,  modern 
Sanskrit  treatise  in  Sutras,  114. 

Kanaka,  author  of  the,  273. 

Kauthuma,  author  of  the,  272. 

Xesh£a,  gesture,  518,  562. 

Kevalanvayi,  571. 

Kevala-vyatireki,  571. 

Jt/tala,  quibbling,  509. 

Khyati,  discrimination,  325. 

A'invat  bridge,  had  antecedents  in 
the  Veda,  83. 

jfiTit,  Supreme  Spirit,  246. 

jKtta,  440. 

—  work  of  the  Manas,  470. 
Klamaths,  a  N.  American  race,  their 

view  of  creation,  83. 
Knowledge  alone  leads  to  Moksha, 
217. 

—  true,  or  Samyagdarsana,  235. 

—  arises  from  conjunction  of  At- 

man  with  Manas,  549. 

—  not  eternal,  552. 

—  of  ideas,  riot  things,  559. 

—  characteristic    feature    of    Self, 

561. 
Kramamukti,  slow  advance  towards 

freedom,  215. 
Krishna,  the  hero  of  the  Bhagavad- 

gita,  of  Kshatriya  origin,  39. 

—  similarity  of  name  with  Christos, 

81. 

—  Dvaipayana,   name   for  Badara- 

yana,  153. 
Kn'ttikas,  the  time  for  mowing,  no 

star-worship  in  India,  49. 
Kriyaphalas,  the  four,  270. 
Kriyayoga,  465. 
-  working  Yoga,  453. 
Krypto-buddhists,  401. 
Kshatriyas,  as  philosophers,  n. 
Kumarila  Bhafta,  276. 
Kusuruvindu  Auddalaki,  273. 


LAKSHA.ZVA,  secondaryapplication 

of  a  word,  232. 
Language,  thoughts  on,  520. 
Laukayatika,  124. 
Laukayatikas,  materialists,  113. 
Letters,  idea  of,  elaborated  by  the 

Hindus  before  they  knew  the 

Semitic  alphabet,  528. 

—  have  no  raison  d'etre,  533. 
Limgamatra,  i.  e.  Buddhi,  447  n. 
Logos,  the  result  of  Avidya,  240. 

—  or  Sophia,  522. 

Lokayata,    used   by   Buddhists  for 
philosophy  in  general,  130. 

—  or  world-wide  system,  130. 

—  atheistic,  276. 
Lokayatikas,  atheists,  41. 


Lokayatikas,  or  Laukayatikas,  here- 
tics, 129. 
Lokayita  system,  575. 

MADHAVA'S    account    of  Nyaya, 

493- 

Madhusudana,  590. 
Madhyamika    Vritti     by    Sandra 

Kirtti,  479. 
Madras,  the,  274. 
Magandikos,  315. 

Mahabharata,  as  a  law-book,  28,  39. 
Mahabhutas.  331. 
Mahat  is  not  Phenician  Mot,  340. 
Maitrayawa  Upanishad,  147. 
Manas,  central  organ  of  perception, 

213,  383- 

—  mind,  227,  330,  546. 

—  train,  383. 

—  point  of  attention,  383. 

—  a  mere  instrument,  383. 

—  is  cognitive,  432. 

—  different  from  Buddhi,  441. 

—  or  mind,  as  Ami  or  atom,  502, 

5°3,  552- 

—  as  nitya,  eternal,  503. 

—  eternal  and  numerous,  503. 

—  many  manifestations  of,  548. 

—  ninth  and  last  of  the  Dravyas, 

583- 

Manifestation  or  intuition,  186. 

Manu,  403. 

Maruts,  eleven,  help  to  make  up 
the  thirty-three  Devas,  50. 

Maurya,  name  of,  doubtful,  157. 

Maya,  or  Mayadevi,  name  of  Bud- 
dha's mother,  122. 

—  not  mentioned  in  the  old  Upani- 

shads,  123. 

—  illusion,  206,  212,  243,  368. 

—  sometimes  called  Sumvriti,  481. 

—  doctrine,  a  disguised  Buddhism, 

599- 
Meaning   of  a   word,   the,    is   that 

which  it  chiefly  aims  at,  594. 
Meditation    with    or    without    an 

object,  447. 

—  Bhavana,  448. 
Megasthenes,    description    by,    305 

B.C.,  35. 
Memory,  549. 
Menancler,    Greek   king,    converses 

with  Buddhist  philosophers,  84. 
Meru,  359. 
Metaphors,  255. 
Metempsychosis,  Sawsara,  137. 
Milinda  (Menander)  and  N:\gasena, 

dialogues,  importance  of,  84. 
Mimawsa,  quoted  in  Upanishads,  6. 

—  use  of,  in  Upanishads,  in. 

—  method,  275. 


R  r 


6io 


INDEX. 


Mimamsas,  two,  403. 

—  Nyaya  and  Vaiseshika,  590. 
Mimawsaka,    Darsana,   referred   to 

by  Bhartnhari,  118. 
Mimamsakas  require   Sabda   to  be 

eternal,  524. 

—  maintained     the     superhuman 

origin  of  the  Vedas,  271. 
Mind,  relation  to  language,  88. 

—  dispute  with  speech,  91. 

—  for  Manas,  441,  502. 

—  modified   by    objects  perceived, 

453- 

Miracles,  462. 
Misdeos,  name  for  Vasu  Deva  on 

Indo-Parthian  coins,  83. 
Mnemonic  literature   in    India,  4, 

121,  268. 
of  India,  reduced  to  writing, 

154- 

Moksha,  highest  aim  of  Kapila,  358. 
Mokshadeva,  or  Master  of  the  Tripi- 

iaka,  Sanskrit  name  of  Hiouen- 

thsang,  38. 
Mokshadharma,  596. 
Monotheism,    Monism,    tendencies 

working  together  produce  idea 

of  supreme  personality,  53. 
Morality   depends   on    prescriptive 

sacra  or  on  Samaya,  511. 
More,  Henry,  Holenmerian  theory 

of,  227. 

t/Ludha,  stupid,  331. 
Mudrus,  457. 
Mukhya-Prana,  228. 

—  vital  spirit,  as  first  Upadhi,  213. 

—  the  vital  spirit,  394. 
Miilikurthas,  354. 
Munrfasavako.s,  315. 
Murdhanya  Nadi,  capital  vein,  231. 

NACHE1NANDER  AND  NEBEN- 

EINANDEK,  308. 
Nagarsruna,  author  of  the  Madhya- 

mika-Sutras,  480. 

—  first  century  A.D.,  480. 
Nai>hWtika,  30. 

Naiyayiku  derives  what  is  not  yet 

from  what  is,  3^7. 
Naiyuyikas    believe    in    God    as    a 

Creator,  41. 

—  hold  the  Veda  to  be  non-eternal, 

4/o- 
Namadha,  name-giver,  name  given 

to  the  one  God,  62. 
Namadheya,  technical  name  of  each 

sacrifice,  262. 
Narnai  iipa.  206. 
Narna  rupas,  the,  vanish  with  each 

Kalpa,  -'42. 
Nfiruyawa  is  Brahman,  185. 


Nasadiya  hymn,  64. 

Nastika,  heretics,  129. 

Nastika  or  .Karvaka  system,  1 29. 

Nate-Sutras,  Silalin  author  of,  127. 

Nebeneinander,  truer  key  to  growth 
of  philosophical  ideas  than  the 
Nacheinander,  97. 

Nescience,  cosmical,  201. 

Newton's  system,  and  Darwin's 
theory  of  evolution,  427. 

Niebuhr's  derivations  of  Indian 
philosophy  from  Greece,  506. 

NiganWias,  315. 

Nigrahasthana,  unfitness  for  dis- 
cussion, 509-510. 

Niranumana,  327,  328,  351. 

Niratisaya,  nonplus  ultia,  421. 

Niratman  (selbstlos^,  343. 

Nirnaya,  ascertainment,  509. 

Nirodha,  restraint,  441. 

Nirvana,  388. 

—  also  Nirvata/;,  488. 

—  not  a  technical  term  in  Pamni's 

time,  488. 

—  the  blowing  out  of  passions,  489. 
Nirvana,  or  Du^khanta,  142. 
Nirvikalpa,  one  kind  of  Pratyaksha, 

1 88. 

Nirvitarka,  454. 
Nishedas,  or  prohibitions,  260. 
Northern  Kurus,  359. 
Notion,  Anubhava,  502. 
Nyasa.  writing  (Vyasa?\  154. 
Nyaya,  derivation  of,  69. 

—  not  found  in  Upanishads,  ill. 

—  modern,   confined  to    Pramana, 

512. 

—  later  books  of  the,  513. 
Nyaya-miila-vistara,  272. 

Nyaya  and  Vai.seshika  represent 
Self  endowed  with  qualities, 

377- 

—  a    first   step  towards   truth, 

37s'  4°3- 

—  systems,  434. 

—  relation  between,  474. 
Nyaya-philosophy,   history  of,  476, 

484. 

—  also    applicable    to    the    Purva- 

Mimamsa,  484. 

—  studied  first  century  A.  n.,  518  n. 
Nyaya  on  Spho^a,  542. 

—  rccoRiii>e(l  the  Veda,  547. 

—  calls  Yoga  to  its  aid,  559. 

OM,  422. 

—  contraction  of  Avam,  423. 
Organic  body,  the,  213. 

PADANI,  appliances,  331. 
Padurtha,  not  categories,  99. 


INDEX. 


Padartha,  the  meaning  of  a  word, 

492. 
Padarthas    of    Kanada,     the    five, 

190. 

—  (ornne  scibile),  475. 
Padma-Purana,  599. 
Padma  Sambhava,  576. 
Padmasana,  457. 
Pain,  nature  of,  361. 

—  meaning  of,  389. 

Paksha,   or   member   of  a  Vyapti, 

563- 

—  or  terminus  minor,  564. 
Pakshilasvamin,  477. 
Palm-leaves  pierced,  552. 
Panini,    lost     Sutras     known     to, 

127. 
Pawini's     principle    as    to    letters 

forming  a  word,  529. 
Pan&adasi,  281. 

—  author  of  the,  quotes  the  Madh- 

yamikas,  480. 
Pajifcaratra,   account    of  system  in 

Prasthana  Bheda,  106. 
Pan/caratras,  41. 
Pawfcasikha,  philosopher  referred  to 

in  Sarakhya-Sutras,  1 1 8,  386. 
Pantaenus    in    India,    one    of  the 

teachers  of  Clement,  82. 
Para,  higher  knowledge,  2 1 5. 
Parables,  Buddhist  love  of  teaching 

by,  401. 

Para  gati,  the  highest  goal,  32. 
Parama-lsvara,  highest  Lord,  439. 
Paramartha,   a  law   teacher,    A.  D. 

557-589,  29T- 
Paramartliika,  real,  480. 
Paramatman  is  Isvara,  but  Isvara 

is  not  Paramatman,  556. 
Parampara,  tradition,  as  handed 

down  orally,  97. 

—  mnemonic  literature,  285. 

—  of  the  Brahmans,  401. 
Parasara,  596. 

Parasarya  (Vyasa),  author  of  Bhik- 
shu-Sutras,  127,  154. 

Paravada,  controversies,  294. 

Paravairagya,  higher  impassive- 
ness,  593. 

Paribhagakos,  315. 

Parikshit,  old  King,  15. 

Pariwama,  evolution,  243. 

Parinama-vada,  theory  of  evolu- 
tion, 107. 

Parivragraka,  or  Bhikshu,  32. 

—  an  itinerant  friar,  33. 

—  (mendicants  ,  41. 

Pasupata,  account  of  system  in 
Prasthana-Bheda,  106. 

Pa<aliputra,  Buddhist  Council  at, 
276  B.C.,  34. 


Patangali,  author  of  Yoga-Sutras, 
and  PataiZgrali,  author  of  the 
Mahabhashya,  156. 

—  the  grammarian,  age  of,  1 56. 

—  by  no  means  settled,  157. 

—  second  century  B.  c.,  288. 

—  the    philosopher    may    be    the 

same  as  the  grammarian,  410. 

—  called  Phanin,  or  Sesha,  410. 

—  date  of,  only  constructive,  41 1. 

—  called  a  portion  of  Sankarshawa 

or  Ananta,  412. 

—  histheistic  Samkhya- philosophy. 

417. 

P&tikka,  Samuppada,  495. 
Perception,  Pratyaksha,  496. 

—  contact  of  sense  with  its  object, 

5H- 

—  contact  of  the  senses  and  mind, 

SH- 

—  contact  of  mind  and  the   Self, 

514- 

—  Sruti,  520. 

Perceptions,  always  perceived  as 
perceptions  of  something,  211. 

Pessimism,  139. 

Phala,  rewards,  556,  562. 

Phanibhartn,  412. 

Pha?«in,  name  for  Patanc/ali,  410. 
41 2. 

Phenomenal  and  fictitious,  differ- 
ence between,  243. 

Philosophical  ideas  common,  137. 

—  systems,    parallel    development 

of,  307. 

—  sects  at  the  time  of  Buddha,  315. 
Philosophies  and    Sutras,   relative 

age  of,  286. 

Philosophy,  different  ways  of  study- 
ing, 239. 

Pin  run  through  sheets  of  a  MS. 
seems  simultaneous,  but  is 
successive,  514. 

Pit/iyawa,  path  of  the  fathers,  231. 

Pleiades,  the  return  of  calmer 
weather,  49. 

Plotinus,  Holenmerian  theory  of, 
227. 

Postures,  Yogangas,  455. 

—  and  tortures,  466. 
Prabhakara.    commentator  on    the 

Mimamsa,  276. 

—  a  Mimamsaka,  562. 
Practical  life  (Vyavahara),  386. 

—  purposes  (Vyavaharartham),  210. 
Pradhana,  Prakn'ti,  413. 
Pradyumna,  246. 

Pragrapati,  supreme  god,  55. 

attains    more    personal    char- 
acter, 59. 

—  a,  called  Visva,  &c.,  341. 


R  r  2 


6l2 


INDEX. 


Pra<7apati,  403. 

Pragrwa,   or  Giva,    individual   soul, 

283,  341. 
Prakaranasama,  arguments  telling 

on  both  sides,  509. 
Prafci,  previous,  258. 
Prakriti,  nature,  potential  matter, 

206. 

—  not    the    author    of    creation, 

206. 

—  wrongly  translated   by   nature, 

207. 

—  nature,  known  as  Maya  (magic), 

212. 

—  or  Urstoff,  369. 

—  is  not  at  work  when  not  perceived 

by  a  Purusha,  370. 

-  different    from     nature,  <pucrir, 

380. 

—  Prakasa,  or  light,  381. 

—  first  wakened  to  life  by  disturb- 

ance of  its  three  constituents, 
381. 

—  in  all  her  disguises,  Purusha  and 

the  dancer,  387. 
Prakriti-purusha-viveka,  374. 
Prakn'tilaya,  325. 

—  absorbed  in  Prakriti,  448,  449. 
Prakritis,  eight,  380. 
Prakriti's  unselfishness,  392. 
Pralaya,  the  idea  of,  recent,  145. 
Pralayas,  absorptions  of  the  whole 

world,  144. 

Prama?ia,  only  one  admitted  by  the 
Lokayatas,  130. 

—  instrument  of  measuring,  188. 
Pramana,  496. 
Pramawa-samu/cfcaya,    the    Tibetan 

version,  518. 
Pramanas,   187. 

—  three  essential,  188. 

—  the  three  go  back  to  one,  190. 

—  authoritative  sources  of  know- 

ledge, 265. 

—  of  Gaimini,  265. 

-  three,  358. 

—  eight,  518. 

in      different       Philosophical 
Schools,  562. 
Pramoya,  501. 
Prameyas,    objects    of  knowledge, 

544- 
Prana  =  breath,  name  given  to  the 

one  god,  62. 

Prilwas,  vital  spirits,  227. 
Pranava,  422. 
—  the  inner  guide,  439. 
Pranayamas,  451. 
Pras<'n;i;/it,  35. 
Prasthana-bheda,  treatise  on  philo- 

sophical  literature,  98. 


Pratipathi-karmani,  263. 
Pratisakhyas,  285. 
PratisawArara  is  dissolution,  345. 
Pratitya,  dependent  or  conditioned. 

480. 

Pratityatva,  480. 
Pratiyogitva,  573. 
Pratyahara,   complete   abstraction, 

458. 
Pratyaksha,  sense  perception,  188. 

—  two  kinds  of,  188. 

—  perception    and    Anumana    in- 

ference,   ignored    by    Badara- 
yawa,  191. 

—  applied  by  Badarayana  to  Sruti 

(revelation),  193. 

—  perception,  513. 
Pravn'tti,  activity,  552. 
Prayoga-vidhis,  260. 
Prayoj/ana,  purpose,  504. 
Presumption  (Arthapatti\  266. 
Pretyabhava,  transmigration,  552, 

553- 

Primeval  waters,  existing  apart 
from  Prajrapati,  96. 

Punarukti,  useless  repetition,  296. 

Purawa  Kasyapa,  teacher  men- 
tioned in  Buddhist  annals. 
117. 

Puratana,  403. 

Purchas,  1613,  mentions  castes  of 
Banians,  n. 

Purusha  — man,  name  given  to  the 
one  god,  62. 

—  (soul)  does  not  migrate,  but  tin- 

Sukshma-sarira,    subtle   body. 
138. 
Purusha,  331. 

—  name  of  supreme  deity,  332. 

—  one  or  many?  335.  336. 

—  never  the  material  cause  of  the 

universe,  375. 

—  state  of,  when  free,  387. 

—  rendered  by  Self,  not  by  man, 

407  n. 
Purushas    of  the  Samkhya,  many. 

374- 

Purushottama,  431. 
Purva.  the  prius,  469. 
Purvafraryas,  301. 
Purva-Mimawisa,     the     first     st<'p. 

iS4. 
Purva-Mimiimsa,  258,  263,  265. 

—  and  Uttara-Mimamsa,  279. 

—  charged  with  athei.--in,  434. 
Purvapaksha,  267. 

Purvavat  preceded  by  a  prius.  497. 
J'ytliagoras,    identified   witli    Bud- 
dha-guru, 79. 

—  claimed    a   subtle    covering    for 

the  soul,  393. 


INDEX. 


613 


QUALITIES,  578. 

Quality,  intangible  in  sound,  525. 

EAGAGRIRA,  Buddhist  Council  at, 

477  B.  c.,  34. 

Ragra-yoga,  true  Yoga,  453. 
Raghuvamsa  of  Kalidasa,  272. 
Rahu,  head  of,  442. 
Eaikva  and  Ganasruti,  1  8. 
Rajendralal  Mitra,  425. 
Ramanuga,    lived   twelfth  century 

A.D.,  243. 

—  his  view  of  universe,  367. 
Ramanugra's  system  called  Visishfo- 

Advaita,  245. 
Real  and  the  phenomenal,    differ- 

ence between  the,  211. 
Reason,  Hetu,  566. 
Receptacle,  Asraya,  or  subject,  557. 
Religion      and      philosophy     have 

worked  together  harmoniously 

in  India  alone,  536. 
Religious    persecution,    Buddhists 

and  Brahmans,  38. 
Religious   and    Popular    Poetry   of 

Vedic  Age,  not  one  hundredth 

part  of  it  remains,  54. 
Remembering  is   not   wiping   out, 

443- 
Remembrance,  Smarawa,  502. 

—  can    make   our    mouths   water, 

545- 

Ittddhis,  or  Aisvaryas,  458. 

Rig-veda,  a  fragment  only,  does  not 
represent  whole  of  Vedic  my- 
thology and  religion,  54. 

7?/tambhara,  truth-bearing,  454. 

Hitter,  his  contempt  of  the  Nyaya, 

99- 

Root  expresses  Bhava,  or  Kriya 
action,  531. 


,  the  word,  516. 

—  or  word,  a  Pramana,  1  90. 
Sabdanusasanam,  415  n. 
Sabhapati  Svamy,  462,  463. 
Sacrifice  was  Karman,  work,  259. 
Sadhana-pada,  438. 

Sadness   cleaves   to  all  finite    life, 

39°- 

Saiva  and  Pasupata  systems,  599. 
Sakalya,  17. 
/Sakayanya,  a  Saka,  19. 
Safc-Aid-ananda,  being,  perceiving, 

blessed,  Brahman  called,  221. 
Sakshatkara,  or  manifestation,  186. 
,Sakti,  power,  206. 
Samadhi,  obstacles  to,  424. 

—  meditation  or  absorption,  438. 

—  or  Samapatti,  453. 
Samadhi,  ApragSata,  454. 


Samanya,  586. 

Silmanyato  Drislita,  constantly  seen 

together,  498,  499. 
Samashti,  370. 
Samavaya,     intimate     connection, 

493,  586. 
Sambhava,  probability,  518. 

—  equivalence,  562. 
Samgati,  connection,  267,  269. 
Saww/aya-Vaira^i-putra,          teacher 

•    mentioned  in  Buddhist  annals, 

117. 

Samgiti,  a  council  (symphony),  5. 
Samkara,  literary  works  referred  to 
by,  150. 

—  his  contempt  of  ritualism,  216. 

—  lived  eighth  century  A.  D.,  243. 

—  and  Ramanuga,  points  of  differ- 

ence, 250. 

—  no  better  than  Buddhism,  428. 

—  opposed  to  Sphofci,  537. 
Samkarshana,  246. 
Samkarshawa-kimcZa,  consists  of  four 

chapters,  102. 
Samkharas,  the,  495. 
Samkhya,  distinguished  from  other 

Vedanta-philosophies,  105. 
Samkhya-yoga,     name     occurs     in 

Upanishads,  in. 
Sawkhya-Darsana,   referred   to    by 

Bhartrzhari,  118. 
Samkhya,  mentioned  in  Buddhist 

texts,  122. 

—  and   Yoga   systems   are   Snm'ti, 

193. 

—  dogma  of  effect,  208. 

—  the  dualistic,  209. 

—  philosophy,  281. 

—  ideas,  influence  of,  283. 

—  atheistic,  yet  orthodox,  303. 

—  title  of  two  systems,  Samkhya 

and  Yoga,  343  n. 

—  immortality  of  the,  398. 

—  parables,  399. 
Sarwkhya-Yoga,  402. 

Samkhya  as  Satkaryavada  the  op- 
posite of  the  Buddhist  view  of 
the  world,  481. 

—  and  Yoga  treated  by  Madhusu- 

dana  as  different  from  the  two 
Mimawzsas,  590. 

—  knowledge,    superior    to     other 

systems,  595. 

Samkhya-karikas,  the,  290. 
exist  in  a  Chinese  translation . 

292. 
Samkhya-Sutras,  date  of,  1380  A. P., 

no. 

fourteenth  century  A.  D.,  288. 

Samkhya-yogins,  the,  439. 
Sawikhyas,  followers  of  Kapila,  41. 


R  r  3 


614 


INDEX. 


Sawkhyas  derive  what  is  not,  from 

what  is,  397. 
SamkoAita,  247. 
Samradhanam,       accomplishment, 

222. 

Samsara,  can  ))e  stopped,  363. 
Sawsaya,  267. 

—  or  doubt,  504. 
Samskara,  instincts,  419. 
Sawskaras  and  Vasanas,  469. 

—  impressions,  469. 
Sawvn'tika,  480. 

Sarwyama  constituted  of  Dharana, 
Dhyana  and  Samadhi,  459. 

—  leads  to  Siddhis,  perfection.  459. 
Sunanda,  joyous,  449. 
Sanaiidana  Afcarya,  philosopher  re- 
ferred to  in   Sawkhya-Sutras, 
118. 

San/cara  is  evolution,  345. 
Sanskrit  proper  names,  410. 
Santa,  pleasurable,  331. 
Santi  Rakshita,  576. 
Sanumana,  327,  328. 

—  with  inference,  351. 
•Sarira,  body,  227. 
Sarmanas,  35. 

Sasmita,  with  false  conceit,  449. 

Sastra,  the,  379. 

Sat-karyavada,  every  effect  pre- 
exists, 208. 

Sat-karyavada,  396. 

Saurnanasya.  serenity,  468. 

Savage  tribes,  their  philosophy,  7. 

!-avig>a.  with  a  seed.  448. 

Savikalpa,  one  kind  of  Pratyaksha, 
188. 

Savifcara,  deliberative,  449. 

—  and  Nirvi/cara,  454. 
Savitarka,  argumentative,  449,  453. 
Savitri  (Asura  ,  the  enlivener,  one 

of  the  agents  of  recurring 
events  of  nature,  spoken  of  in 
Veda,  46. 

Schopenhauer  on  the  Persian 
translation  of  the  Upanishads, 

25.7.- 
Science  of  Language,    and  Science 

of  Thought,"  526. 
Second  century  is.<;..  411. 

—  inference,    A  vita,    not    straight- 

forward, 500. 
Securus  jut  Heat  orbis    ttrrarum,    .Sar- 

valaukikapramatva,  555. 
Seed  must  perish  before  tlie  flower 

can  appear,  553. 
Self  of  God  and  man,   the   same, 

254- 
Self,  characteristics  of  the,  501. 

—  does    not   begin    with    birth    on 

earth,  546. 


Sensation  without  perception,  514. 

Senses,  Indriyas,  545. 

Sesha,  name  for  Patajjgrali,  410. 

—  or  posterior,  497,  499. 
Shashd-tantra,  298. 

—  the  Sixty-doctrine,  355. 
Siddhanta,  267. 

—  tenets,  504. 

Siddhis,  perfection,  459-461. 

—  miraculous  powers,  466. 
Sign,  Linga,  or  Vyapya,  498. 

—  bearer  of  a,  Lingin,  498. 
Siladitya     Harshavardhana,    com- 
monly    called    Sri-Harsha    of 
Kanyakubgra,  610-650,  37. 

Silalin,  author  of  Nafa-Sutras,  127. 
Similarity,  Samyam,  232. 
Sita,  daughter  of  Ganaka,  14. 
Siva,  found    on    earliest    Mauryan 

coins,  80. 

Six  systems  of  philosophy,  589. 
Sixteen  Topics,  or  Padarthas,  489. 
Sixty-two   systems   of  philosophy, 

22,  27. 

Skambha,  support,  name  given  to 
the  one  god,  62. 

-  the     universal     support,     one 
meaning  of  Brahman,  92. 

Skanda  found  on  earliest  Mauryan 

coins,  80. 
Sleep,  state  of,  229. 

—  comes  when  Manas  enters  Pura- 

tati,  503. 
Smrt'ti  includes  philosophy,  4. 

—  reduced  to  writing,  121. 

Srnn'tis  of  the  Sawkhya-yoga,  ob- 
jections to  convergence  of  the 
Vedanta  passages  on  Brahman. 
103. 

-  philosophies    of    Gotama    and 
Kanada  treated  as,  105. 

Souls,  multiplicity  of,  600.^ 

Sound,  a  quality,  having  Akasa  or 
ether  for  its  substance,  524. 

Space,  582. 

Sphofci,  'the  eternal  word -Brah- 
man,' 85,  90.  527. 

—  Vedanta  on,  536. 

—  Yoga  and  Sawkhya  on,  539. 

—  Nyaya  on,  542. 

—  Vaiseshika  on,  543. 

—  sound,  distinct  from  the  letters. 

528. 

Sphoiayana,  527. 
.Sradilha,  faith,  348. 
;-Tiiti  and  Srrm'ti,  3. 

—  or  revelation,  the  only  evidence 

invoked  by  B&darftyana,  191. 

—  and  Apta-va/cana,  difference  be- 

tween, 307. 

—  inspiration,  325. 


INDEX. 


State  religion  in  India,  34. 

Statistics,  to  be  used  with  caution, 
60. 

Stem  and  root,  meaning  of,  531. 

Sthiila-  and  Sukshrna-sarira,  227, 
228. 

Subhashitas,  445. 

Subject  and  object,  as  real  or  phe- 
nomenal, 201. 

—  identity  of,  223. 
Subject! vation,  372. 
Substances,  578. 

Subtle  body,  according  to  the  Ve- 

danta,  394. 

Sukha,  bliss,  348,  349. 
Sukshma-sarira,      migrates      after 

death,  228. 

—  subtle  body,  394. 

the  Linga-sarira  of  the  Sara- 

khya-philosophy,  395. 
Summum  lonum,   the  Ni&sreyasa  of 

Gotama,  484. 

—  of  the  six  systems,  485-48$. 
Sunya,     not     altogether     nothing, 

481. 
Sunyavada,  nihilism,  29. 

—  doctrine  of  emptiness,  210. 

—  emptiness  doctrine,  242. 

—  nihilism,  480. 
Suppiya,  22. 

Supreme   Being  acting  from  com- 
passion, 433. 
Sutara,  352. 
Sutra  style,  4,  266. 
Sutra,  a  Buddhist.  =,76. 
Sutra-vn'tti  by  Bodhayana,  245. 
Sutras  known  to  Buddhists,  20. 

—  their  style,  121. 

—  now    lost,    known    to    Pawini, 

127. 

—  ascribed  to  Bn'haspati,  127. 

—  style  of  the,  285. 

—  of  Kapila,  called  Manana-sastra, 

institute    of    reasoned    truth, 

379- 

—  fables  in    the    fourth    chapter, 

399- 

• —  the  philosophical,  later  than 
Buddha,  412. 

—  date  of,  574. 

Suttas   (Sutras),    name   of  part    of 

Buddhist  Canon,  112. 
Suvarwa-Saptati-sastra,  the,  291. 
Svabhasa,  self-illuminated,  470. 
Svastikasana,  457. 
Svetaketu,  485. 
,Svetasvatara  Upanishad,  the  three 

Gunas  found  first  in  the,  282. 

—  Upanishad,  343. 
Syadvada,  25,  29. 
Syllogism,  560. 


Systems  of  philosophy,  the  Six,  ex- 
isting during  period  from  Bud- 
dha, fifth  century,  to  Asoka, 
third  century,  119. 

TAD  EKAM,  that  One,  the  neuter 

Supreme  Being,  63. 
Taifirasa,  327,  328,  341. 
Taittiriya,  author  of  the,  273. 
Takakusu,  Dr.,  292. 
Tamasalina,  352. 
Tanmatras,  five,  328. 

—  (this  only).  382. 

Tantra,  cumulation  of  concurrent 

rites,  264,  265. 
Tapas  of  the  Hindus,  409. 
Tarka,  old,  475. 

—  refutation  or  reasoning,  508. 
Tat  vam  asi,  Thou  art  that,  160. 

—  Thou  art  it,  485. 
Tattva-samasa,  294. 

—  the,  318. 

Tattvas,  the  twenty-five,  320. 
Technical  terms  in  Upanishads,  6. 
Tedanrfikos,  315. 
Tennyson,  quoted,  205. 

—  ancient  sage,  255. 
Terebinthos,    pupil    of  Scythianos, 

name  famed  among  followers 
of  Mani,  84. 
Terminus  minor,  Paksha,  564. 

—  major,  Vyapaka,  564. 

—  medius,  Vyapya,  564,  565. 
Terms  used  in  Hindu  philosophy, 

not  the  same  as  we  use,  203. 
Theodicee,  the  Hindu,  225. 

—  an  ancient,  278. 
Third  place,  the,  235. 

Third  Valli   of   Katfza   Upanishad, 

177- 

Three  couples  of  philosophical  sys- 
tems, 403. 

Time,  582. 

Time,  present,  past,  future,  515. 

Titthiyas.  or  Tirthakas,  313. 

Traigunya,  343. 

Tranquillity  (SantiN(,  388. 

Triad,  Dharma,  Artha  and  Kama, 

79- 

—  of  elements,  131. 
Tripifaka,  date  of,  19. 

Trithen,  Dr.,  and  Prasthana  Bheda 

99- 

Truth  better  than  sacrifice,  473. 
—  Prama,  561 . 

Tryawuka,  three  double  atoms,  384. 

Tushrts  and  Siddhis,  353,  353  n. 

TvasbJn,  the  maker,  not  real  crea- 
tor, of  all  things,  57. 

Two  Brahma iis,  the  word  and  the 
non-word,  533. 


6i6 


INDEX. 


UDDALAKA,  26. 
Uddyotakara,  not  Udyotakara,  477. 
Urfulomas,  29. 
Untiersalia  in  relus,  521. 
Upadana,  material  cause,  207. 
Upadhi,  condition,  563. 
Upadhis,    limiting    conditions    of 
name  and  form,  207. 

—  five,  213. 

—  conditions,  impositions,  213. 

—  or  conditions,  227. 

—  conditions,  498. 
Upalabdhi,  perception,  227. 
Upamana,  comparison,  516,  587. 

—  belongs  to  the  Nyaya  school,  516. 
Upanishad-period,  700  B.  c.,  6. 
Upanishads,  known  to  Buddhists, 

28. 

—  existence  of,  recognised  in  Bud- 

dhist Canon,  112. 

—  translation    of,  published    1879, 

1884,  179. 

—  character  of  the,  182. 

—  contain  the  seeds  of  later  philo- 

sophy, 183. 

—  and  Vedanta,  something  between 

the,  187. 

Upiisakas,  laymen,  33. 
Upavarsha,  teacher  of  Panini,  153. 

—  the  Vedantist,  538. 

Upayas,  means  of  attaining  Sama- 

dhi,  451. 
Uposhadha,  310. 
Utpatti-vidhis,  original  injunctions, 

262. 
Uttarapaksha,  267. 

VAGAPYAYANA,  words,  mean  a 

genus,  532. 

Vaikarika,  327,  328,  350. 
Vaikhanasa-Butras,  loss  of ;  referred 

to  by  Bhnskarafciirya,  1 13. 
Vairagya  -  sataka     of     Gaina/earya, 

445- 
Vaisuli,  Buddhist  council  at,  377  B.C., 

34- 

Vaiseshika,    word     not     found    in 
Upanishads,  ui. 

—  on  Splio/a,  543. 

—  philosophy,  574. 
Vaiseshikas,    followers   of  Kaw'ida, 

41. 

—  creation  and  dissolution  accord- 

ing to,  145. 
Vaishnavas  (Ramanuga),  theory  of, 

contrasted  with  that  of  Brah- 

mavadins,  107. 
Va/r,   direction    taken    in   Veda    by 

thoughts        connected        with 

speocli,  8(5. 
VaAaspati-Misra,  on  Buddhi,  324. 


VaA-aspati-Misra,  tenth  century.  479. 
Valkala,  dress  of  bark,  35. 
Vanaprasthas,  13,  35. 
Vanijr  =  Banian,  n. 
Varaha-Mihira     mentions     Kapila 

and  Ka?iabhu<7,  316. 
Varna,  colour  and  caste,  13. 
Vasanas,  impressions,  229,  419. 

—  dispositions,  469. 
Vasso,  from  Varshas,  310. 
Vasubandha,  knew  the  six  Tirthya 

philosophies,  478. 
Vasunetra  of  the  Vaiseshika  school, 

577- 
Vasus,    seven   in   number,  can    be 

distinguished,  =,0. 
Vaftagamani,     So     B.  c.,     Tripi/aka 

written,  5. 
Vayus,  winds,  350. 
Veda,  infallibility  of  the,  146. 

—  the,  wants  no  proof,  195. 

—  meaning  of,  195. 

—  acquisition  of  the  mere  sound. 

meritorious,  268. 

—  superhuman  origin  of  the,  270. 

—  authority  assigned  by  Kapila  t<> 

the,  305. 

—  cannot  prove  the  existence  of  a 

Supreme  Being,  435. 

—  the  word  of  Brahman,  517. 
Vedadhyayana,  learning  the  Veda 

by  heart,  184. 

Vedanta,   word  does  not  occur  in 
old  Upanishad,  in. 

—  or  Uttara-Mimamsa,  148. 

—  the  first  growth  of  philosophical 

thought,  151. 

—  followers  of  the,  called  Aupani- 

shadas,  152. 

-  fundamental  doctrines  of  thr. 
159. 

—  resume  of  the,  160. 

—  philosophies,  two,  252. 

—  monism  of,  283. 

—  iirst  occurs  in  the  Svetasvatara, 

288. 

—  and  Sawzkhya,  early  relation   Iw- 

tween.  338. 

—  the,  monistic,  369. 

—  on  Sphota,  536. 
Vt-danta-Siira,  281. 
Vedanta-Sutras    and     Badaniya/ia. 

earlier  than  tins  Bhagavad-gita, 

'49- 

—  and  Bhagavad-gita,  relative  ag<- 

of,  155. 

—  methodical,  184. 

Vedantins,  followers  of  Upanishad.s. 

41. 
Vedantist,   a,   does   not  really  jnin 

Brahtnan,  404. 


INDEX. 


617 


Vediintists  derive  the  unreal  from 

the  real,  397. 

Vedas,  authority  of  the,  195. 
—  sound  of,  eternal,  273. 

—  words  of  the,  supernatural,  273. 
Vedic   gods,    three    classes— (i)   of 

the  sky;    (2)  of  the   mid-air; 
(3)  of  the  earth,  48. 
Vedic  hymns,  date  for,  2000  B.  c.  or 
5000  B.C.,  little  gained  by  this, 

44- 
Vedic  Vafr,  a  feminine,  74. 

—  coincidence  with  Sophia  of  0.  T., 

76. 

Vedo*dhyetavyaft,  269. 
Verbal  symbols,  216. 
Vibhuti-pada,  438. 
Vibhutis,  powers,  458. 
Videhas,  bodyless,  448,  449. 
Vidhatn,  arranger,  name  given  to 

the  one  god,  62. 
Vidvan-moda-tarahgini,  278. 
Vidyamatra,  knowledge  only,  210. 

—  doctrine,  559. 
Vijrwana-Bhikshu,  supposed  to  have 

composed  the  Sutras,  289. 

-  373,  377,  59°- 

Vikaras,  sixteen,  330. 

Vikasa,    or  higher  enlightenment, 

144. 

Viniyoga-vidhi,  262. 
Virasana,  457. 
Virtue,  a  preliminary  of  Moksha, 

218. 
Viruddha,  arguments  proving  the 

reverse,  509. 
Visakha  found  on  earliest  Mauryan 

coin,  80. 

Visesha,  gross  elements,  447  n.,  586. 
Vishamatvam,  unevenness,  147. 
Vishaya,  267. 
Vishnu,  410. 

—  disguised  as  Buddha,  599. 
Vishjju-I'urawa,  598. 
Visish&i-Advaita,    Ramanug'a's   sys- 
tem, 245. 

Visva,  or  Vaisvanara,  341. 
Visvakamma,  later  development  of 

Visvakarman,  59. 
Visvakarman,  described,  vague  and 

uncertain  character,  59. 

—  maker   of  all    things,    adjective 

showing  germs  that  were  to 
grow  into  supreme  deity,  used 
as  substantive,  57. 
Visve,  or  All-gods,  represent  first 
attempt  at  comprehending  the 
various  gods  as  forming  a  class, 

51- 

Vitanrfa,  cavilling,  509. 
Vivarta,  turning  away,  243. 


Vivarta-vada,    theory    of    illusion, 

107. 

Vivasvat,  403. 
Vivekananda,  279. 
Vividisha,  desire  of  knowledge,  348, 

349- 

Viyoga  or  Viveka,  407. 
Vn'ha  or  Vn'dh-a,  possibly  Sanskrit 

words,  72. 
Vn'shadeva  received  Samkara?  292. 

—  king  of  Nepal,  A.D.  630,  292. 
Vyarfi,     words     mean     individual 

things,  532. 
Vyakta,  247. 
Vyapaka,  or  sine  qua  non,  189. 

—  what  pervades,  563. 

—  or    Siidhya,     terminus    major, 

564. 

Vyapta,  pervaded,  563. 
Vyapti,  universal   rule,  pervasion, 

563,  57°- 

—  a,   may  be  true  in  ninety-nine 

cases,  yet  not  in  the  hundredth, 
569. 

—  threefold,  571. 

Vyapya,   what  must  be  pervaded, 

563- 

—  terminus  medius,  564. 

Vyasa,  identified  with  Badarayana, 
148. 

—  lived  at  the  end  of  the  Dvapara 

age,  148. 

—  never  named  by  Sawikara  as  the 

author  of  the  Sutras,  148. 

—  the  father  of  Suka,  1 49. 

—  called  Parasarya,  154. 

—  and  Harihara,  336. 

—  commentary  on  Yoga-Sutras, 410. 
Vyashd,  370. 

Vyavaharika,  phenomenal,  481. 

WEBER,  A.,  Professor,  73,  40211. 

Whole,  is  there  a?  515. 

Women,    present   at    philosophical 

discussion,  14. 
Wood-architecture,      previous      to 

stonework,  So. 
Word,    the,    as   a   creative   power, 

87. 

—  or  Sabda.  500. 

Words,  meaning  of,  conventional, 

5i7- 

—  express  the  summum  genus,  530. 

—  not  names  of  individuals,  bxit  <>f 

classes,  534. 

World,  phenomenal  reality  of  the. 
202. 

—  created  by  the  Word,  520. 
Worlds,  the,  created  from  the  Word. 

197. 
Worship  (Upasana),  215. 


6i8 


INDEX. 


Writing,  allusions  to,  121. 

—  when  first  attempted,  in  India, 

285. 
Written  letters  called  unreal,  121. 


YAGJVAVALKYA,  15. 

—  and  Ganaka,  17. 
Yafckafc,  anybody,  333. 

Yama  and  Yami,  usually  identified 
with  Adam  and  Eve,  children 
of  Tvashfrt,  but  childless  them- 
selves, 58. 

Yoga,  quoted  in  Upanishads,  6. 

—  distinguished    from    Vedanta- 
philosophies,  105. 

—  not  union,  222. 

—  in    the    Taittiriya    and    Katfia 

Upanishads,  288. 

—  and  Sawkhya,  402. 

—  meanings  of  the  word,  404. 


Yoga,  is  Samatva,  equability,  404. 

—  not  union,  but  disunion,  405. 

—  means  really  Viyoga,  406. 

—  steadying  of  the  mind,  440. 

—  Taraka,  or  ferry  across  the  world, 

467. 

—  is  it  Nihilism  ?  471. 

—  and  Sawkhya.  on  Sphote,  539. 
Yoga-Sutras,  438. 
Yogafraras,  29. 

Yogarigas,  helps  to  Yoga,  456. 

—  accessories  of  Yoga,  458. 
Yoganusasanam,  415  n. 
Yoga-sara -samgraha,  abstract  of  the 

Yoga,  416. 
Yogins  in  Maitray.  Up.  VI,  288. 

—  perceptions  of  the,  429. 
—  nine  classes  of,  450. 

ZARADES  (Zoroaster),  name  found 
among  followers  of  Mani,  84. 


THE  END. 


OXFORD:  IIORACK  HART,  PKIXTKK  TO  THE  UNIVERSITY 


UNIV.  OF  CALIF.  L1CRARY.  LOS  ANGELES 


-<& 


3  115801175  0535 


A    001322230    2 


•-',. 


•77 


